


Coda

by INMH



Series: trope-bingo Fanfiction Fills 2016 (2nd Quarter) [3]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Developing Friendships, Drama, Gen, Homesickness, Hurt/Comfort, More hurt than comfort tbh Khan is a stubborn bastard, Past Medical Experimentation, Past Torture, Road Trips, Strong Language, What-If, mild violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-12
Updated: 2016-10-12
Packaged: 2018-08-19 07:23:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8195798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/INMH/pseuds/INMH
Summary: AU to STID. Jim Kirk did not keep Khan alive just so the idiot could provoke him into killing him later.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I’ll show my ass here and admit upfront that I have a limited knowledge of the Original Series (and most of Star Trek beyond the AOS and the comics attached to it) and its history. I’ve seen some episodes, but not all of them, and none of the original movies. I only have a rudimentary knowledge of Khan's backstory, both in TOS and the AOS. Once I have a bit less to work through on my bookshelf, I plan on ordering the Star Trek graphic novel that was written to explain AOS Khan's backstory so I can get a better feel for what Into Darkness was going for (yeah, yeah, the comics probably aren't canon, but oh well.)
> 
> But for the sake of this fic (and any off-shoots it may produce), we’re gonna say that Star Trek (or at least the parts prior to, say, 2000) adheres to our real world’s history; ergo, no Eugenics Wars in 1992. So in this sense, Khan and his crew were created and trained to do those things, and may have caused a bit of mayhem in isolated places here and there... but nothing that ended up making it into the history books. They didn’t get up to any of the stuff they did in the Original universe.
> 
> So we’ll say that in this AU, Khan isn’t... _Evil, per se_ … Just a really arrogant, ruthless motherfucker, with a considerably different approach to handling threats than what they do in the 23rd century, and maybe less empathy than some people would prefer. 
> 
> IDK man I wanted to see if I could write NotEvil!Khan. Or at least MorallyAmbiguous!Khan. 
> 
> (Basically this all translates to "Khan is an interesting character and I want to explore him in the context of being an ally to Kirk and the Enterprise crew, and I can't do that if he's snoozing in a cryotube". Humor me.)

[-alpha-]

Jim knew it was time to drop Khan.  
  
Marcus was secure.  
  
Everyone was in position.  
  
All he had to do was give the signal.  
  
Jim could see Khan reflected in a monitor beyond the captain’s chair where he had Marcus pinned. Khan had a phaser pointed at Marcus. Or Jim. Really, it was hard to tell since Jim was standing directly in front of Marcus.  
  
He took a deep breath.  
  
_Drop him_ , the voice in his head whispered. _Drop him fast, drop him hard._  
  
Khan was dangerous.  
  
( _He helped us, and he hasn’t fucked us._ )  
  
Khan was a terrorist.  
  
( _Give him a chance._ )  
  
Khan flat-out said he would walk over his cold corpse to retrieve his crew.  
  
( _And you wouldn’t?_ )  
  
Jim would.  
  
He would, and he wasn’t sure that answer made him feel good.  
  
[---]  
  
Khan was reasonably certain that Kirk meant to drop him.  
  
He heard the captain whispering with that ‘Scotty’ man. Khan didn’t like it much when people whispered around him, especially when the people in question weren’t to be trusted. Perhaps it was natural intuition, perhaps it was something that had been coded into his DNA before he was even born, but Khan had an innate sense for danger, and right now, he felt it.  
  
He should drop the captain.  
  
Kirk was only going to lock him in a cell and drag him back to Earth anyways, and it was laughable to think that he would get a fair trial. Or even if he did, that the remaining outposts of Section 31 wouldn’t get to him before he was sentenced.  
  
Or his crew.  
  
Dropping Kirk was logical. Marcus’s minimal crew was stunned. He could take down Scotty and the blonde woman easily. And then he would have complete control of the Vengeance.  
  
He should drop Kirk.  
  
So why didn’t he?  
  
What was so difficult about pulling the damn trigger and killing the man?  
  
[---]  
  
Jim shut his eyes.  
  
“Khan, put your phaser down. Is there anything Scotty needs to know about piloting this ship?”  
  
After a tense moment of hesitation, Khan slowly lowered his phaser and turned to look at Scotty. “I take it you have some technological acumen?”  
  
“Yes…?” Scotty looked back and forth between Jim and Khan, confused.  
  
Jim paused, mulling over it for a moment, and then sighed.  
  
“Phaser down, Scotty.”  
  
[---]  
  
Kirk was going to drop him.  
  
Khan was certain of it.  
  
There was no reason for Scotty to look so confused otherwise.  
  
So why didn’t he do it?  
  
Why did he order his man to stand down?  
  
Khan’s instincts told him to take advantage of the situation. His future, his crew’s future, was a terribly uncertain thing, and now would be the time to take a step in securing it. Four people, that was all he had to take care of: Kirk, Marcus, Scotty, and the blonde woman.  
  
He thought about it, thought so clearly about bringing his phaser up and shooting Kirk in the back, right between the shoulder blades, that he felt his hands twitch with anticipation.  
  
_Do it._  
  
**_Do it._**  
  
Khan thought for a long moment.  
  
But instead of raising his arm and taking the shot, he slowly paced over to the control panel, motioning for Scotty to join him.  
  
_Idiot! Why didn’t you do it?_  
  
And Khan thought, almost helplessly in the confines of his own mind, _I don’t know._  
  
[---]  
  
After the Vengeance was secured, Marcus and his remaining men were locked in the brig, and everyone but Scotty and Carol were on board, Jim led Khan to the medbay. He motioned for two of the security team to stay outside, and the other four to follow them inside and stand by the door.  
  
He pointed at a bed. “You’re going to sit here,” Jim said, weary and not at all interested in dealing with anymore fuckery today. “And you’re gonna stay here until we get back to Earth. There are guards outside the door. Do everyone, including yourself, a favor, and don’t do anything to make me regret not locking you in the brig.”  
  
“I don’t think you want to lock me up anywhere near Marcus,” Khan said sleekly, eyes flashing in an almost hungry way.  
  
“We have more than one cell, believe it or not.”  
  
“Still too close.”  
  
“I figured.” Jim rubbed his eyes. “Look, lie down. Take a nap or something. It’s been a long day.”  
  
“For you.”  
  
“Are you ever going to let go of this ‘I am better’ thing?”  
  
“When it stops being true, perhaps.”  
  
Was Khan joking? Was that a joke? Was Khan capable of joking? Sweet Jesus, maybe Jim was more tired than he realized.  
  
“Whatever. Just stay here and don’t do anything stupid.”  
  
“Oh hell no,” Bones came out of his office, leveling a glare at him. “You’re not leaving that lunatic here. It was one thing when you were trying to dupe Marcus, but now you want to leave him here on our way back to Earth?”  
  
“Security’s posted inside and outside the door. He’s not gonna try anything, Bones. If he was going to, he would have done it on the Vengeance when there were only a few of us to contend with.”  
  
Bones didn’t look placated, exactly, but he did give up the fight and wander back to his office, muttering something about needing a drink. Right before he got to the door, though, he turned back and leveled a dangerous look at Khan. “Fuck up my medbay and I’ll fuck you up in kind. Mark me.”  
  
Khan raised an eyebrow at that. “Understood,” He said lightly, sounding a little amused. Jim almost wanted to warn him about what Bones could do with a piece of medical tape and a bit of imagination, but he had more important things to do. Like, for instance, coming up with an explanation for Starfleet Command about why he had an Admiral locked up in his brig.  
  
“You two play nice now. I’ll be on the bridge if the fur starts flying.”  
  
[---]  
  
Khan wasn’t fond of medical facilities.  
  
He’d been weary of them in the 21 st century, but after a stint in Section 31, he _fucking_ hated them. It didn’t help his sense of unease that the lead physician who’d been examining him earlier was eyeing him distrustfully from his office.  
  
He wasn’t tired, not in the way Kirk implied he might be, not in the way the Captain himself was. Khan was built to withstand tiredness physically, but he also knew how to stave off the effects consciously. He had been awake for almost four days straight at this point, but he did not need to sleep yet.  
  
As for the Captain… Khan could read exhaustion in every line of the younger man’s body; his savagery, in many ways, tended to express itself almost in animalistic terms. Khan’s ability to detect things like sagging posture (relaxation) or the slight trembling of one’s hands (tiredness), the scent of blood (injury), or the slight rasp of a person’s breathing (sickness) was terribly reminiscent of the cues animals picked up on in the prey that they stalked.  
  
There was something satisfying about seeing Kirk tired, worn out; that animalistic part of him was satisfied that someone who fell under the heading of “potential prey” was in no shape to defend himself. It made no difference at the moment, since Kirk was gone and Khan had no designs to harm or kill him in the near future. Trying right now would be impractical.  
  
And trying later… Well, for the moment, Khan saw no benefit in killing Kirk. With no reasonable ability to escape the Enterprise, he would undoubtedly be returned to Earth, and that would mean being handed over to Starfleet authorities. And for the time being, Kirk and his crew were the only people who could confirm Khan’s version of events to whatever governing body would be responsible for trying him.  
  
_This is idiotic. You should take a hostage. Secure your crew. **Once you get to Earth, Starfleet will hand you to Section 31 and let you rot.**_  
  
But no matter how much he attempted to compute an escape, no matter how much he meditated on his options, the knowledge he’d gained of this ship in his limited time on it, he couldn’t find a satisfactory solution that did not involve either leaving some of his crew behind (not an option, those remaining would almost certainly be killed in retaliation) or being handed over to Starfleet first (a poor option, but at least one that provided for future opportunities).  
  
These connections and conclusions were not forming with their usual speed. And now that he tried to force his mind to perform rapid calculations, he found it was cloudier than he’d realized. Perhaps he did need some…  
  
No. Not _need_.  
  
Khan was not a slave to his body the way most humans were. He did not _need_ sleep. He could survive without it far longer than most people realized. He could function without it for less time than that, but still far longer than a human could. He was far above either of those thresholds right now.  
  
Although… Sleep would certainly be beneficial right now. In a matter of hours they would be on Earth again, and he would undoubtedly be interrogated, which might require a great deal of clear-headed thought. He did not _need_ sleep to endure whatever they meant to do to him, but it also wouldn’t hinder him if he chose to indulge in it for the time being.  
  
Besides, it wasn’t as though there was anything else to do until they reached Earth. If he moved from this bed, the doctor would probably have him shot.  
  
So Khan laid down, the sudden, fluid movement causing the guards by the door to start and raise their weapons. He rolled his eyes shut, and the red-shirted men disappeared. Others might have rolled over, but sleep would be difficult enough to find without having to worry about men with weapons pointed at his unguarded back. The fact that he was attempting to fall asleep in a medical facility wouldn’t help either.  
  
Khan tried to clear his mind and fall asleep.  
  
He failed on both fronts.  
  
[---]  
  
They were nearly at Earth now.  
  
Jim’s stomach was cramping with anticipation. He was actually starting to feel a little sick. He’d been on bad terms with Starfleet high command after the Nibiru incident (among other things), and he didn’t think for a second that it was anything but Pike’s interference that stopped him from being punished more harshly.  
  
He was going to have to answer for a lot of things.  
  
A lot of things that Starfleet could very well drag him over the coals for.  
  
Such as, for instance, conspiring with a wanted terrorist to take down a Starfleet Admiral and capture his ship.  
  
“Coming into Earth’s orbit, Captain.”  
  
Jim took a deep breath and squeezed the arm-rests of his seat.  
  
_Please, oh please, do not let this be a bad call._  
  
“Bring us in, Mr. Sulu.”

[-beta-]

The verdict was unexpected, given the crime.  
  
Not prison.  
  
Not execution.  
  
Not a return to his cryotube.  
  
Khan would remain an operative of Starfleet for the next twenty-five years. The words “indentured servitude” were never spoken aloud, but he knew that was the gist of his punishment, because this was not a choice; he would go where Starfleet told him to, when they told him to, and he would not offer up a peep of protest if he didn’t want to end up frozen with the rest of his crew.  
  
None of whom, by the way, would be revived until the twenty-five years of his service were up.  
  
Back in the day, he’d have been executed without question. It was a wonder Section 31 hadn’t come for him already.  
  
There was something to this. There was the obvious motive of using Khan’s technological skills for Starfleet’s benefit, but they could have just as easily done that by giving him a life-sentence of service. Instead, they had put a limit on it: 25 years, and he and his crew would be free.  
  
Khan didn’t curse often, even to himself. It was unseemly, and he did strive to behave in a dignified fashion.  
  
But that was a load of _bullshit._  
  
Did these people think that he was an idiot? Did they honestly believe that he was stupid enough to buy this sham of a sentence? Because there was no way, under any theory, that these people would allow him and his crew to go free, no strings attached. Giving him the promise of freedom and his crew was merely a carrot to dangle over the horse’s head, something to keep him in line. It would be a cold day in Hell before they set his crew loose on the world- _any_ world, for that matter- promise or not.  
  
It shouldn’t have come to this. He had realized his mistake in not escaping earlier once he’d been handed over to the authorities. Security was tighter than he thought it would be: It was evident that certain sections of Starfleet had advised his jailers on how to best keep him restrained until he went to trial. Whether it was Kirk or Section 31, he wasn’t sure. All he knew was that there were at least six pairs of eyes on him at all times: Two sitting right outside his cell, constantly staring; two guards reflected in a mirror poised on the wall across from his cell, to prevent him from surprising them; and more likely two more watching on the other side of the camera in his cell.  
  
At his trial, he had no reason to expect leniency or mercy, and so he was brutally honest: No, he did not regret opening fire on a room full of people who were Marcus’s coworkers. No, he did not regret bribing Lieutenant Harewood into planting the bomb in the Kelvin Memorial Archive. He operated under the presumption that Starfleet was aware of Marcus’s and Section 31’s activities, and had sanctioned them to do everything that they had done, up to and including the subterfuge with the Enterprise.  
  
“Unless, of course, the left hand doesn’t know what the right is doing,” He had suggested, and was deeply satisfied to see the irritation on the faces of the Starfleet Admirals. Whether he had been correct or incorrect- and he still fully believed that the upper echelons of Starfleet had been utterly aware of Marcus’s activities, there was little anyone could say to convince him otherwise- it looked bad for them. If they knew, and did nothing, they looked like war-mongering monsters; and if they didn’t know, they looked like incompetent fools who couldn’t manage their own people.  
  
No, Khan did not censor himself. He was honest. “Marcus was my enemy. I did not and do not have reason to believe that Starfleet as an institution did not endorse and sanction his activities. With the same perspective and information at my disposal, I would make the same decisions again.”  
  
“You would?”  
  
“I see no reason to restrain myself when mine and my crew’s existence is threatened by an enemy.”  
  
After all of that, they expected him to believe that in _any_ amount of time, he would be appropriately reunited with his crew?  
  
These people were idiots.  
  
Khan wasn’t handcuffed when they led him to the turbo-lift (he didn’t believe he could hate elevators any more than he already did until he’d first taken a ride on one of these machines) but he was still accompanied by a pair of guards.  
  
And, at the last second, Captain James T. Kirk, quickly followed by his Chief Medical Officer, Leonard McCoy- neither of whom, from the looks on the guards faces, were supposed to be in the lift with them.  
  
“Captain,” Khan greeted shortly. “Doctor.” He wouldn’t say he trusted Kirk, per se, but he was reasonably certain at this point that the man had little to do with whatever cloak-and-dagger activities his superiors were engaging in. “To what do I owe the unexpected pleasure?”  
  
“Uh…” Kirk ran a hand through his hair. He wasn’t making eye-contact with Khan; from a man less brazen as Kirk, that wouldn’t have been unusual, as Khan knew very well how intimidating humans found him. But Kirk was not frightened of him, not even in this small, confined space where Khan was uncuffed and could easily murder his four fellow passengers. “Well, you know how you’re going to be working with Starfleet?”  
  
Khan barely resisted the urge to roll his eyes, instead keeping them focused firmly on the wall in front of him. “I seem to recall it being mentioned at some point in the recent past.”  
  
Kirk let out a long, low breath. “Well… Ah, heck, I don’t see any point in dragging this out. You’re on the Enterprise.”  
  
That was… Unexpected. Khan assumed that Kirk would want him as far away from his ship and his crew as humanly possible. Or inhumanly possible, given that Earth was no longer just a planet of humans.  
  
“And why am I on the Enterprise?”  
  
“Because I requested you.”  
  
There was a pause.  
  
Khan sensed that something was going unsaid, and took a stab in the dark. “Let me guess: Nobody else wanted me.”  
  
“Ding-ding,” McCoy drawled, leaning back against the turbo-lift’s wall, arms crossed. “You got it. Can’t imagine why. You’re pretty interesting when you’re not acting like a blood-thirsty psychopath.”  
  
‘Blood-thirsty psychopath.’ That was a new one. Most people didn’t have the balls to say things like that to his face.  
  
The turbo-lift came to a stop, and Kirk and McCoy made for the door. The guards didn’t move, and so neither did Khan. He hadn’t the faintest idea where they were taking him, and right now, he found he didn’t especially care.  
  
“Kirk.”  
  
The Captain turned around, putting out a hand to stop the door of the turbo-lift from closing. “Yeah?”  
  
“I’d like to see my crew. And before you even think of saying it, I will accept nothing short of touching the cryotubes myself as reassurance that they have not been killed or harmed in some way.”  
  
Kirk frowned, but it was sad rather than frustrated or inconvenienced. Khan felt a spike of anger- he did not like pity. He was above it. “I’ll do what I can, Khan.”  
  
Khan said nothing. He just kept his eyes locked with Kirk’s until the door closed.  
  
[---]  
  
“Why, in the name of God, did you volunteer to take this guy aboard the Enterprise?”  
  
Jim grimaced, rubbing his temples. He was starting to get a headache, and the background noise of the restaurant was not helping. “I wouldn’t use the word ‘volunteer’, necessarily.”  
  
Bones downed his drink and slammed the glass down on the table with a little too much force. If he kept doing that, the waitress was going to cut him off. “And what do you mean by that, exactly?”  
  
“I believe Jim is inferring that Starfleet high command requested that he accept Mr. Singh as a member of our crew.” Spock said perfunctorily, hands folded calmly on the table.  
  
Bones raised an eyebrow. “Did they ‘request’, or did they demand?”  
  
Jim let out a long sigh and slouched in his seat, head falling back against the padded covering of the booth seat. “It was more like a… Threat, kinda.”  
  
Spock’s eyes widened minutely. “They threatened you?”  
  
“Uh, I believe the exact wording was, ‘given the thin ice you were treading prior to your little excursion, it would be best for you to comply with the will of the administration on this matter’.”  
  
“That does sound vaguely threatening, Jim.”  
  
“It sounds _very_ threatening to me,” Bones grunted.  
  
At that moment, Jim’s phone buzzed, and he wriggled it out of his pocket to check the message he’d received. After a moment, he deflated. “Shit.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“That was Admiral Bennett. He’s rejected Khan’s request to see his crew.”  
  
Bones frowned. “Why?”  
  
“If I may speculate," Spock interjected, "the Admiral may have some legitimate security concerns about allowing Khan access to his crew. Especially if said access was in the capacity that he was requesting.”  
  
Bones stared at him oddly. “What does he think the guy’s gonna do? Stuff seventy-two cryotubes under his jacket and run?”  
  
“There is a considerable possibility that Mr. Singh could tamper with the cryotubes if allowed access to them. After all, the technology originated in his time, he might have greater ease operating them than we realize. There is also the potential concern of him memorizing the location of his crew and returning to free them at a later date.”  
  
“I’m not saying they should give him the key to whatever warehouse they’re being kept in and give him free reign to do whatever the fuck he pleases, I’m saying that completely restricting the guy from the one thing that’s been proven to drive him into a murderous rage is maybe _not_ the way to convince him that Starfleet’s intentions are pure. I mean, seriously, Spock, if you were in his shoes, and you were standing in front of an organization that employed a man who used you and manipulated you, and is connected to a highly unethical shadow organization that performed illegal _medical experiments_ on you- never mind the fact that they basically held him hostage there so they _could_ experiment on him- how exactly would you react to being told that you couldn’t even see them?”  
  
Spock considered that for a moment. “Your point holds some merit, Leonard.”  
  
“You agree with me? God-damn, that’s a sign of the end-times.”  
  
Jim ran a hand through his hair. “But you’re right. Khan’s not gonna be happy. Which is probably why they expect me to tell him.”  
  
“It might be best, Jim, if Leonard and I accompanied you to see Mr. Singh,” Spock suggested. “Given the nature of your news, it may be unwise for you to confront him alone.”  
  
Spock had a point. Jim was still wary of Khan: The man had proven he wasn’t a complete lunatic, he was capable of behaving himself when he had the proper motivation and wasn’t being threatened (otherwise there was no way in hell he'd be setting foot on the Enterprise again), but then, Jim wasn’t one-hundred percent certain what Khan would classify as a threat, and he had looked… _Displeased_ felt like an understatement for the look on Khan’s face when they’d read the sentence.  
  
Personally, if Jim had killed a bunch of people and got sentenced to work for Starfleet for twenty-five years, he’d be heaving a sigh of relief (especially since if it were Jim, he would have been up for treason charges; Khan, not actually being a member of Starfleet, had had the treason charges dropped in favor of others). But he still wasn’t sure what was going on in the guy’s head, and his only educated guess right now was that Khan was not _thrilled_ to be going to work for the institution that had played a role in holding him and his crew captive.  
  
Jim tried to envision how the ‘you can’t see your crew’ conversation might go.  
  
After about six scenarios, three of which ended with Khan punching him in the face, the other three ending with Jim getting strangled on the floor, he grimaced.  
  
“Yeah, if it’s not too much trouble. I’ll tell him in the morning.”  
  
“May God help us,” Bones muttered, signaling to the waiter and tapping the side of his empty glass nervously.  
  
[---]  
  
Khan woke up to the feeling of a knee digging into his back, and something sharp just barely cutting into his throat.  
  
At first, he thought it was a nightmare: He’d had his share of those throughout his lifetime, especially since waking up in the 23 rd century. He hadn’t been sleeping well anyways- sleeping soundly in unfamiliar spaces was a challenge for him, and everything he’d slept in since waking up qualified as ‘unfamiliar’. But as such, his sleep was often light and his dreams hazy and confused, and it wasn’t unusual for Khan to lose touch with reality until his mind was clear again.  
  
It didn’t take long, though, to realize that this wasn’t a dream.  
  
He knew the right way to get this person off of him with minimal injury to his throat. He knew how to get rid of the knife and kill the stranger before they’d had a chance to hit the floor. He thought about the sound of snapping bone, shoving cartilage into brain-tissue and watching the stranger seize on the floor as they died.  
  
But he didn’t. Khan held perfectly still.  
  
Because he knew what this was.  
  
If the person had wanted him dead, they would have done that already before he had a chance to get up and defend himself. They had wanted him to wake up. They wanted him to be afraid.  
  
Fear was a superfluous emotion for him. He did not need it. He was not afraid of the knife. He was not afraid of the person.  
  
But still, Khan did not move an inch.  
  
For a moment or two, there was silence save for their breathing. Khan’s was steadier than his attacker’s. But then he felt cloth press against his ear, cloth covering a mouth with hot breath.  
  
“Don’t think you’ve won.”  
  
Khan nearly started, surprised by the warped quality of the voice. Whoever was doing this was smart enough to conceal themselves.  
  
“Your time will come.”  
  
The knife pressed harder, and Khan gritted his teeth as a drop of blood slid down the blade and dripped onto the white sheets below.  
  
“You and your ‘ _family’s’._ ”  
  
The last word was spoken with a sneering mockery that Khan was more accustomed to hearing from his own mouth.  
  
“Don’t move.”  
  
Khan didn’t plan on it.  
  
“Not for five minutes.”  
  
They had a car. If they were going on foot, they’d have needed at least ten to get far enough away that he couldn’t find them.  
  
Once the pressure on his back and the knife at his throat disappeared, following the command made him _burn_. He wanted to chase them down, feel the bones in their neck crap and snap and twist beneath his hands. He’d had fantasies about doing similar things to members of the science team in Section 31, and the possibility of being able to act it out on one of their agents nearly made him salivate.  
  
But he didn’t.  
  
Khan stayed right where he was, digging his fingers into the fabric of the sheets and breathing slowly, trying not to scream with rage. If he killed whoever it was that had just been in his room, a significant number of potential courses of action would be closed off to him. Undoubtedly whoever had sent that agent was keeping a watch on the clock, waiting for a message or signal that the agent had finished their job and was unharmed. If they did not report in, Khan assumed there was a taskforce standing by to recover them and take him out at the same time.  
  
He’d be killed, or put back in a cryotube. Or worse, he’d be remanded to Section 31’s custody. His crew would likely be killed; it would be idiocy of the highest caliber to remove them from their own cryotubes for additional testing, since it would give Khan an undisputed ally. This was assuming, of course, that they were even still alive.  
  
When the minutes had passed, Khan rolled over and stared at the ceiling, weighing his options.  
  
This episode only confirmed what he had suspected: Starfleet had no intention of setting his crew free at the end of his sentence. Maybe they would be killed, maybe _he_ would be killed, and Starfleet would come up with some excuse as to why his crew could not be set free: _They’re too dangerous, there’s too many of them, look at the damage **he** wrought when he was awake, and you don’t think for a second that they’ll believe we didn’t have something to do with his death, do you?_  
  
They wouldn’t.  
  
They’d know better.  
  
Much like he had on the Enterprise, Khan ran through all possible scenarios- but much like the one he’d settled on then, the only one that yielded anything even remotely positive was also undesirable and risky in its own way.  
  
The idea was that he should take his chances and run. Find a hiding place to regroup, gather resources, plot, and strike back to get his crew when he had the chance.  
  
This, of course, had a number of potential risk-factors, the largest of which being that Starfleet may decide to cut their losses and just kill his crew outright, to prevent him from getting them back and waking them up. It was certainly the plan of action that Khan would consider under the same circumstances: Destroy that which would give him power and support, and he would eventually collapse from the effort of keeping himself going on his own.  
  
Never mind the fact that if he ran, much like if he had decided to kill that agent, it would mean the end of any pretense of mercy or kindness from Starfleet. They would take his escape as an indicator that he meant to do them further harm. If and when they caught him again- and as much as it frustrated him to do so, Khan did accept that there was a strong possibility that he could and would be recaptured- there would be no appeal, no defense, no nothing. Just punishment, and very likely one that would effectively prevent him from ever accessing his crew again.  
  
Khan was not averse to taking calculated risks. Every option he had at the moment presented one, and escape provided the least amount under the assumption that staying would mean certain death for him or his crew eventually.  
  
But it also presented a more personal problem.  
  
Running would, more or less, mean abandoning his crew.  
  
For the moment, Khan had to assume that his crew was somewhere he would never think to look: Probably not in the U.S., and if Starfleet was especially cautious, not even on Earth. His crew might not even be together, split up in various places in order to prevent him from finding and awakening them all at once.  
  
Khan was not a man prone to sentimentality, and the majority of his crew was not either. But while his remark to Kirk that his crew was his family was, in many respects, meant to manipulate the Captain’s own feelings towards his crew, there had been more than a grain of truth in it. The people that made up his crew were the closest thing he’d ever had to a family; he understood them, and they understood him. They had a loyalty to one another not unlike the loyalty that bound Kirk’s crew to him.  
  
He would like to think that they would understand. He would like to think that they, with their equally pragmatic sensibilities, would understand that a tactical retreat would be wise, and that at the moment he did not have the resources to reach and recover them. He’d like to think that they would make the same choices under the same circumstances, and that they wouldn’t hold this against them.  
  
All the same, it felt like a betrayal.  
  
It felt like he was _abandoning_ them.  
  
And unlike Kirk’s sad attempts at a beating, unlike the needle that McCoy had used to take his blood, unlike the phaser fire that had grazed him onboard the Vengeance, the idea that he was leaving his family behind to rot…  
  
It _hurt._  
  
[---]  
  
Jim did not want to kill Khan.  
  
Yet.  
  
After ten minutes of standing in front of Khan’s apartment, knocking every couple of minutes, he had started to lose his patience.  
  
After briefly texting Admiral Bennett, who was officially in charge of managing Khan’s activities for the next twenty-five years, and learning that the man was not scheduled (read: not authorized) for any activities outside of his apartment that day, Jim’s patience was hanging on by a fine thread. And it was only by that fine thread that he managed to avoid kicking in the door.  
  
Fortunately, it seemed that Khan had opted (if he’d even had a choice) for technology that was as old as he was, and it wasn’t difficult to pick the lock.  
  
“Jim, I highly question the wisdom in illegally entering a living space belonging to a man who has a history of violence against those who upset him,” Spock remarked as Jim stepped into the apartment.  
  
“Oh, well that’s the fun part, Spock,” Jim retorted as he looked around, eyes narrowing. “Because I don’t think Khan is here.”  
  
Bones cautiously opened a door, and then shook his head. “Bed’s made. _Perfectly_ , if you were wondering. And I’m sorry, but even he can’t control the sound of water running in a shower. So I gotta throw my vote on ‘he’s not here’ too.”  
  
Jim took a deep breath, the irritation turning to dread. It was one thing to think that Khan was ignoring him, but it was something else entirely to consider that the guy might have run off. There were guards outside the building, placed covertly to make sure that Khan didn’t go running off. But Khan was a slippery bastard, and somehow Jim suspected that it wouldn’t be difficult for a man who’d been built for war and combat to know how to successfully evade an enemy when he wanted to. And he would have known the guards were there- he wasn’t stupid, after all.  
  
Jim pulled out his phone and dialed Chekov. It took a few rings, but eventually the young Ensign answered, sounding sleepy. “ _Что происходит?_ ”  
  
Jim had no idea what that meant, but assumed it was a greeting. “Chekov?”  
  
Suddenly, the kid sounded a lot more awake. “ _Captain? Is something wrong?_ ”  
  
Jim pinched the bridge of his nose. “Uh, there might be. Let’s say, just for the sake of argument, that I needed you to… Get into Starfleet’s system, undetected, and look up an active tracking device?”  
  
There was some scrambling on the other side of the line, “ _Uh, yes- I can do that, I think, it would help if you had the device’s number?_ ”  
  
Jim thought for a moment. “Try… 05739604216.”  
  
Bones raised an eyebrow at him, but Jim waved him off. He’d memorized the serial codes of the various tracking devices used on Khan a while ago. It wasn’t hard- they were sequential, so it was really just the last two or three numbers that would change- but he was well aware how extreme it sounded. Some people might call that paranoia, he called it insurance in the event that his leniency had been misplaced.  
  
He waited silently, listening to Chekov tap away for a few minutes. “ _Ah… Yes, yes, I have found it. The tracking device is just outside of Carson City, Nevada._ ”  
  
Okay. _Now_ he wanted to kill Khan.  
  
“Can you patch me in so that I can follow the signal myself?”  
  
“ _Certainly, Captain. The location will update every… Seven point three minutes._ ” Another pause. “ _Captain, may I ask what this is-?_ ”  
  
“It’s better that you don’t,” Jim cut in quickly. “If anyone asks, I refused to tell you what it was about.” He didn’t like putting Chekov into this kind of situation, but there could be some serious goddamn consequences to Khan running off into the night, and he needed to get ahead of things before they got too far.  
  
“ _…Aye, Captain._ ”  
  
“Thank you, Chekov.”  
  
Jim ended the call and turned back to face Bones and Spock. The former had his arms crossed over his chest, both eyebrows raised now, and it was really _sad_ that Bones knew him so well that he seemed to be able to guess where this was going.  
  
“Tell me you’re not thinking of doing what I _think_ you’re thinking of doing.”  
  
“There’s a lot of thinking in that sentence, Bones.”  
  
“Well, one of us has to do it,” Bones snapped.  
  
“Am I correct in concluding that you intend to locate Mr. Singh and bring him back to San Francisco, Jim?”  
  
“You would be correct, Spock. I am going to find Khan, and I am going to bring him back here, and no one’s going to find out, and it’s going to be sunshine and rainbows,” Jim confirmed.  
  
Maybe if he kept repeating it to himself it would come true.  
  
“Spock- No.” Jim shut his eyes. “No. What am I thinking? I know how that’s going to end. Not you. _Bones_ , I need _you_ to cover for me. Spock, take Uhura somewhere for the weekend and turn your phone off. If anyone tracks you down and asks you where I am, tell them you’re uncertain of my current location. Exact wording, so it won’t be a lie.”  
  
To the untrained eye, Spock was as straight-faced as ever. But Jim had known him long enough to detect a tiny fraction of a sentiment that was usually much more obvious on Bones’s face: The aptly-named “Fuck You Jim.”  
  
But Bones threw his hands up. “Well, why not? I attached my name to that goddamn recommendation too, so my career’s down the tubes too if that asshole doesn’t come back. Don’t see how lying could make it any worse.”  
  
“I believe our situation could be made exponentially worse by being deceptive with our superiors-”  
  
Bones cut him off with an aggravated snarl. “Oh God, go make-out with Uhura, or whatever it is the two of you do when you’re alone!” He turned to Jim. “And you, I want you to call the moment you get that guy in your sights, so that I know which police department to call if Khan decides to get rowdy. I’m serious, Jim: If he kills you, I’m gonna find a way to use his freaky Augment blood to bring your dumb ass back to life. Mark me.”  
  
Jim snorted, heading for the door. “Yeah, Bones, sure you will.”  
  
Alright, time to find Khan.  
  
And if a couple hours in the car didn’t mellow Jim out, maybe kill him, too.

[-gamma-]

Perhaps the thing that most surprised Khan was the ways in which the world had _not_ changed.  
  
San Francisco, being an urban area (and housing a Starfleet base and the Academy) was considerably modern, by the standard of the current day. But as he’d gone further outside of the city and into the suburban areas and smaller cities and towns, he’d found that many of the houses and buildings were, style-wise, not too terribly different from the houses of the early 2000s.  
  
That might have settled someone else, but for Khan, it only made that strange, unpleasant feeling in his stomach get worse. Said feeling was at its peak whenever he was forced to confront the fact that this was an entirely different day and age from when he’d been born and raised. Were he inclined to regularly acknowledging his baser emotions, he might almost call it sadness.  
  
For the moment, though, Khan was less interested in civilization than in what laid beyond it. There was an old research center out in Colorado that he knew for a fact was still standing, and with the proper camouflage, he would be able to sneak in and gain access to Starfleet’s database. It would take quite a bit of time, but with some finagling he would at least be able to locate his crew and go from there. He’d warped off-planet once, he could do it again.  
  
In the meantime, his problem would be finding sufficient food and shelter. Food would be more negotiable, as he could go without it for longer than a human could. He wouldn’t be in top shape, but he would endure far better. Shelter was more problematic, largely because it required more thought: He had to be sure that wherever he stopped to rest was not a place that the authorities would think to look for him. Some place remote enough to reduce his chances of being recognized, but not _so_ remote that he would stand out as something that didn’t belong.  
  
Which could present some difficulty, since he _didn’t_ belong anywhere in this world. Not without his crew.  
  
He was walking down the street, studiously avoiding eye-contact with passersby without making it obvious that he was avoiding eye-contact, when a voice called out to him:  
  
“Hey honey, what are your rates?”  
  
Khan froze. It took a moment to confirm that yes, yes, that voice was directed at him, and yes, they _were_ asking exactly what it sounded like they were asking. He felt his blood begin to boil, and was about to throw down his bag and make whoever was in that car exceptionally sorry that they hadn’t kept driving-  
  
…And then he recognized the voice.  
  
Khan’s eyes rolled shut, any and all fire in him extinguishing with magnificent speed.  
  
It was James Tiberius Kirk. How, exactly, the man had managed to track him down when he had done a _damn_ thorough sweep of every single item that had accompanied him out of that apartment, was a mystery. One that Khan intended to solve at some point during whatever bloody conversation he was certain was about to ensue.  
  
At least this time Kirk wasn’t repeating that pathetic attempt at a beat-down; although given the look on his face, one that might have given Khan reason for concern if he didn’t know he could take Kirk blindfolded, the possibility of violence was not entirely off the table.  
  
“You must think I’m stupid if you think I’m coming back with you.”  
  
“I think you’re _really_ stupid, actually,” Kirk said casually, rolling the car alongside Khan as he walked. “Because if the top-brass finds out you ran off, you’ll be going back into a cryotube.”  
  
Khan rolled his eyes. Was Kirk honestly naïve enough to think that that wasn’t his future anyways? That Starfleet would honor its word, and return his crew to him when his sentence had run its course? That there wouldn’t be some ‘accident’ in the meantime, some terribly tragic thing that was out of their control? Some malfunction of the life-support on the cryotubes, some engineering incident that caused an explosion, a gas-leak maybe?  
  
No. Khan knew far too well the language of deception, the art of getting what you want from a person whilst simultaneously guaranteeing that they fail to receive proper payment. He knew very well the game Starfleet was playing with him. It did not matter if he ran or if he stayed; even if his crew was still alive, they would not be for long, and Khan no longer had any way of locating them. Starfleet will have tucked them away somewhere safe- and they had plenty of space stations, planets, and ships to choose from now.  
  
That said, he continued to doubt that Kirk was in on the deception. He wasn’t high enough on the food-chain, and he didn’t have the sort of temperament for subterfuge; indeed, he seemed the sort to have a visceral objection to it. He was too idealistic to consider participating in anything as devious as what was being done- and more likely than not, it was that same idealism that prevented him from seeing that it was happening at all.  
  
“Leave. I’m not going back with you.”  
  
“Will you at least tell me why you left?”  
  
“Why don’t you ask your superiors?”  
  
“What, did they tell you already? Then why the hell did they bother sending me to talk to you?”  
  
_What?_ Khan stopped. “Tell me what?”  
  
Kirk stopped the car. “What are _you_ expecting that they’re going to tell me?” Khan grasped the car door and very deliberately dug his fingers in until the metal popped and dented. Kirk glared at him. “This is a rental, asshole.”  
  
Not the response Khan was going for, but he’d take it. “I can always take a hammer to it if you insist on playing games with me.”  
  
“ _I’m_ playing- Oh my God,” Kirk put the car in park and climbed out, slamming the door shut with a bit more force than necessary. He faced Khan, leaning on his door, the car acting as a barrier between them. If it were anyone but Kirk, Khan would have suspected it was a deliberate attempt to keep him at a safe distance, but Kirk didn’t look terribly concerned about his physical well-being judging from his body-language. “Are you kidding me? _I’m_ playing games? You poke and prod and piss at Starfleet high command, and you get a sentence that pretty much adds up to ‘work for us for the next twenty-five years and we’ll forget the fact that you killed a bunch of people’, and then your dumb ass runs off? But _I’m_ playing games, Khan?”  
  
Oddly, Khan almost found himself smiling. Much like with McCoy, it had been quite a time since anyone had had the audacity to look him in the eye and call him a ‘dumb ass’. That sort of insult was not one you threw at a man who could break your spine with his bare hands, and so any banter of an insulting nature was usually thrown between himself and his crew, and even then, he’d only had that sort of relationship with a small, small number of them.  
  
But instead, Khan forced himself to maintain his glare, his irritation. Kirk was interesting, but he was not a friend. He wasn’t even certain if the man could be considered an ally at this point; the question of how he’d managed to track Khan down was still a major concern. “What was it that they sent you all the way out here to tell me?”  
  
Kirk glared right back. “First, I want to know why you ran.”  
  
“That’s information I will only volunteer once _you_ have told me whatever it is your superiors wanted me to know,” Khan spat back. He wasn’t going to move on this; he was at enough of a disadvantage at the moment as it was. He wasn’t going to be giving out information that he could use as leverage.  
  
Kirk huffed. “Fine. If we’re going to do this ‘you first’ ‘no YOU’ crap, then I demand a change in venue. Screaming about classified Starfleet activities in the middle of the street is probably not a great idea, oh brilliant one.”  
  
“You ought to get your hearing checked, _Captain_ , as I’m rather certain neither of us is _screaming._ Unless you’re implying that we should crawl into the boot of your car-”  
  
“-the _what_ of my car?”  
  
Khan rolled his eyes. “The boot. The _trunk._ Whichever terminology you prefer. Unless you’re implying you’d like us to crawl into the trunk of your damn car and talk, then where exactly did you plan on having this conversation?” He wasn’t proud of the irritation he knew was clearly audible in his voice, but maybe it was good to let Kirk know he was on thin ice.  
  
Kirk glanced around the street for a moment, idly scanning the storefronts until his gaze stopped on one.  
  
“Alright, Mr. I Am Better: In here.”  
  
[---]  
  
Khan couldn’t have looked more confused if they’d dropped him on an alien planet and told him to eat orange sludge off the ground.  
  
“What,” Jim smirked a little. “Never been in a burger joint before?”  
  
It belatedly occurred to him that that was a pretty concrete possibility. Khan didn’t look like the sort who indulged in fast-food very often, and Jim was willing to bet that he and his Augment friends had had a controlled diet for most of their lives.  
  
“I’m surprised you still have them, frankly,” Khan muttered. “Back in my day people were railing about how unbelievably unhealthy fast-food was. With all the fuss they made, I’m shocked it hasn’t been outlawed by now.”  
  
Jim was so, _so_ tempted to tell Khan that he sounded like a bitter grandpa talking about the old days, but that could be interpreted as antagonistic, and for once, Jim was honestly not interested in being deliberately antagonistic. “Well, you know, we’ve known smoking’s bad for centuries now and people still do it.” He shrugged. “People do what they do.” Jim picked a bit of lettuce off of his burger and took a bite. Khan hadn’t touched his. “Are you hungry at all?”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Hm. Bones said you have an enhanced metabolism. I thought that meant you needed to eat a lot.”  
  
“Not necessarily,” Was the evasive response.  
  
It was troublingly obvious that Khan hadn’t been eating much lately, as he looked quite a bit leaner than he had when they’d first met. Jim wasn’t a doctor, but he had been trained to recognize signs of significant distress in his crew, and weight-loss was one of them. Given the events of the last two months, it wasn’t a difficult conclusion to reach that Khan was stressed out.  
  
It would also explain why he was so goddamn _crabby._  
  
Jim idly plucked a tomato off the burger too (boy, but these vegetables were soggy) and deliberately kept his eyes on his food. “Alright, so let’s clarify something right now: Starfleet did not send me ‘all the way out here’. They sent me to talk to you at your apartment.”  
  
“Starfleet’s apartment, really,” Khan corrected coolly, and Jim glared at him.  
  
“Are you gonna act like a pissy four year-old this whole conversation? Eat your damn burger and shut up.” He wiped his hands on his napkin. “They sent me to your apartment to tell you that your request to see your crew was denied.”  
  
“Shocking,” Khan deadpanned.  
  
Jim guessed he was better than everyone else at being sassy too. _God, it’s too early, but I need a drink._ “And when we got there this morning, you weren’t there.”  
  
“‘We?’”  
  
“Spock and B- Doctor McCoy were with me.”  
  
“Backup, in case I lost my temper and used your head for target-practice?”  
  
“Exactly,” Jim responded, in precisely the same deadpan that Khan had used. If this guy wanted to play the difficult toddler game, then Jim felt perfectly justified in pulling out his Annoying Little Brother routine, which involved everything from mockery, sarcasm, inappropriate jokes, and a couple dozen rounds of ‘I’m Not Touching You’. If Khan thought he could annoy Jim into going back to San Francisco without him, he was in for a wild ride. He wasn’t better at _everything._ “So, since you specifically instructed me to ask my superiors why you left, I have to assume that your reason for leaving isn’t just because you don’t want to work for Starfleet for the next twenty-five years?”  
  
Khan was silent for a moment. “No.”  
  
Jim let out a little whistle. “Wow, that was the most transparent lie I’ve ever heard, and I’ve told a fair few myself.”  
  
Khan’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “If you want answers, talk to your superiors. Or better yet, talk to Section 31 and have a chat with them.”  
  
Jim frowned, all pretenses of amusement gone. “What? What did they do? Did they do something to you?”  
  
“You feign concern very well. I’m sure it comes in handy when attempting to lull someone into a false sense of security.”  
  
“It’s not feigned. Between what they did to you, what Marcus nearly did to us, and some other things that came to light in the investigation, Section 31 has a lot to answer for. If they came after you or threatened you, I want to know, and I want to see them held responsible for it.”  
  
Khan stared at him for a long moment, looking somewhat confused. Jim knew that look- it was one he’d gotten from authority figures, family members, classmates, crewmates, all sorts of people, usually after he’d done something amazingly, unequivocally, this-one’s-for-the-books stupid.  
  
“What? Why are you looking at me like that?”  
  
Khan let out a slow breath. “You are just…” He trailed off and shook his head.  
  
Jim’s irritation and his curiosity battled for dominance. “You and Lieutenant Uhura should just get together sometime and compare notes, because she looks at me and says stuff like that all the time, and she _never_ clarifies what she means by it.”  
  
The dark-haired man didn’t respond. He seemed to be thinking to himself, staring down at his food but not really looking as though he had any intention of eating it. Finally, he looked up again, and Jim was surprised to see that his expression was one of almost complete calm.  
  
“A Section 31 agent came to the apartment last night, held a knife to my throat, and threatened me. As I am not currently interested in being killed in my sleep, or while I’m awake, for that matter, I decided to escape and consider my remaining options from a safe distance away from Starfleet headquarters and San Francisco.” He frowned. “I thought I had gotten rid of all of the tracking devices.”  
  
“You’d be surprised at where they hide them,” Jim conceded, careful not to tell Khan which trackers he’d likely missed during his sweep. “But Khan, this is serious. We need to go back and tell Starfleet what happened.”  
  
Khan’s expression went from pensive to stony. “I am not going back to San Francisco. I thought I made that clear.”  
  
“What did you think I was going to do when I pulled up to you? Wish you goodbye and good luck?”  
  
“That’s precisely what I thought you’d do. I’m not under the impression that you especially like me.”  
  
“That may be true, but you leaving? That’s not happening.”  
  
Jim couldn’t help but be at least a little intimidated by the force of Khan’s glare. That was the sort of look he used to get right before someone slammed his head into a wall. But he meant what he said: He had no intention of returning to San Francisco without Khan. There was too much riding on this guy to just let him wander off into the night and make a fugitive out of himself again.  
  
And Khan must have realized that this was an ‘unstoppable force meets an immovable object’ kind of argument, because he got up and proceeded to walk to the door.  
  
“Khan? Khan, come on!” Jim cursed quietly and threw some credits down on the table before hurrying after him. Even when walking Khan was faster than a normal man. “Exactly how far do you think you’re going to get?”  
  
Khan didn’t answer, taking a sharp right down an alleyway. Jim threw his hands up and followed after.  
  
He had just rounded the corner at a brisk walk when, without warning, Khan grabbed Jim by the throat, spun him around, and slammed him against the wall. The grip on his throat was just tight enough to be alarming, but not tight enough to really restrict his airway.  
  
“I want you to listen to me,” The Augment whispered, face less than an inch from Jim’s. “And I want you to listen well, because I’m not going to repeat myself. I spent _three years_ in Section 31. They experimented on me. They tortured me. They did things to me that would make your hair turn white. I am built to take abuse, physically and psychologically, but that doesn’t mean that I _have_ to, nor do I especially _want_ to. And I won’t. I’m not going back to that fucking organization like a pig to the butcher’s block. I’m not insane.”  
  
Maybe Jim was reading into things that weren’t there, but he actually thought he could detect a trace of fear in Khan’s eyes. He didn’t know the full extent of Khan’s abilities; hell, he didn’t even know if _Khan_ knew the full extent of what he was, physically, mentally, or emotionally. It was entirely possible that he wasn’t built to withstand abuse as well as he claimed.  
  
“Khan,” Jim said quietly, voice a little strained. “I _need_ you to listen to me. You have very little experience in this century, and you have very little experience with Starfleet. There are not a whole lot of places you can run where they can’t find you. If you run now, it’ll be assumed that you’ve gone rogue, and that means Section 31 will be given complete license to take you down.” It was a low blow, but it seemed he was going to have to go there. “Your crew, too. And this time, there won’t be any second chances, no deals to save them.”  
  
There was a flicker of uncertainty in Khan’s expression. But then he was steel again.  “It’s too late. I’ve already run. Starfleet has my crew, they’re more likely than not dead already, and I’ve never been under the delusion that they’d be set free.”  
  
“No,” Jim insisted. “It’s not too late. Bones is covering for us back in San Francisco. Nobody knows you’re gone. _Yet._ ” He fixed Khan with a pointed look. “As for your crew, I can’t guarantee that you can see them personally. There are security protocols surrounding these kinds of things. But I can try something else.”  
  
Khan’s lip curled back in a sneer. “And what’s that?”  
  
“I might be able to get Spock in to see them.”  
  
“And what would that matter?”  
  
“Vulcans can’t lie.” Jim said. “I’m serious. Ask anyone who’s dealt with them before. Vulcans can’t, as in _literally cannot_ , lie. If Spock finds that your crew is safe, he’ll tell you. And if they’re not, he’ll be compelled to tell you the truth.”  
  
That flicker of uncertainty in Khan’s expression had become much more obvious now. He was finally getting to him. “Even if the Vulcan assures me they’re currently alive and unharmed, you can’t guarantee me they’ll stay that way. Especially once we’ve embarked on the five-year mission.”  
  
“I promised and delivered their safety before, didn’t I?”  
  
“That was on a ship. _Your_ ship, where your command was the law. Starfleet will do as they please, just as they’ve always done.”  
  
“They _won’t_.” Jim insisted. “Because if they do anything to your crew, or they try to call Section 31 on you, I will raise hell like they’ve never known before. And if I raise hell and they try to shut me up, they’ll have about 430 angry Starfleet officers to deal with. I won’t let this go, and my crew won’t either.”  
  
The Augment locked eyes with him; Jim didn’t know if this was him trying to work some Vulcan-esque mind-reading crap, or if he was trying to detect a lie somewhere in his expression, but the man did not move an _inch_.  
  
And then, after a long moment, Khan released him.  
  
“Fine,” He spat, and stalked off towards the car.  
  
[---]  
  
For a while, they drove in silence.  
  
Khan was stewing.  
  
As badly as he didn’t want to admit it, being brought to this century had shaken him in a way he still hadn’t quite recovered from. Most of his time awake had been spent in the confines of Starfleet, and the few times he had managed to slip away had only been brief outings without much time for in-depth study.  
  
It had probably been on purpose. Section 31 and Marcus had known very well how intelligent Khan was, how easy it was for him to absorb new information: Give him equipment he’s never seen before, explain what they do, give him resources, tell him what they are, and within a week later you’ll have a blue-print for a highly advanced starship.  
  
But things like that were simple for Khan. He had always had an inclination for the technical, as well as combat. Those were his specialties: Machinery and War. Better yet if the two should meet, as they did with Marcus’s designs.  
  
But there were things that were less simple for him. Like the foreign races of people that now inhabited Earth, who could interpret an outstretched hand as an indicator of sexual interest, or a smile as a death-threat. Like the politics that have evolved from two chunks of land on a single planet having a pissing match over religion, to planetary Federations and Empires having pissing matches over entire galaxies.  
  
He would choke on his own blood before saying it out loud, but Kirk was right: Khan did not know this century like he did, did not know the full extent of Starfleet’s reach in the galaxy, and did not know how to appropriately hide himself in a world where the science fiction of his time has become a stark reality.  
  
There was, however, a question left to be answered.  
  
“What is it that you hope to accomplish by returning me to San Francisco?” Khan inquired after some time had passed. “What exactly are you trying to do, Kirk?”  
  
The question went unanswered for nearly five minutes. In that time, Khan came to assume that Kirk was still bitter about getting pinned in the alley, or simply about Khan taking off in the first place, and was keeping quiet out of spite.  
  
But eventually, he did answer.  
  
“I am trying,” Kirk said quietly, eyes glued to the road for more, Khan suspects, than just safety’s sake, “to be empathetic. I am _trying_ to put myself in your shoes and understand why you might have fired on a room full of Starfleet officers without especially caring who you hit. I am trying to remember that you were born and raised and frozen before Starfleet proper was even a thought in anyone’s mind, and that you have no experience with it beyond ‘these people are assholes who used me and threatened my crew’. I am trying to remember that you were doing exactly what you were raised to do. That you have yet to learn that there’s more to life than that.”  
  
He wasn’t _wrong_ , technically; Khan was built and trained and _made_ for war. Aggression was a logical conclusion for him under the correct circumstances (Khan was not entirely without tact or sense, after all). But that didn’t stop him from feeling somewhat condescended to, as Kirk had more or less just accused him of not knowing any better, like he was a child who’d thrown a toy at a playmate.  
  
Still, Kirk’s honesty- and it was honesty, there was nothing about this conversation that indicated falsehood- was both surprising and informative.  
  
“But you don’t forgive me.”  
  
Kirk was silent for a moment. Khan idly counted the seconds: Sixty-eight.  
  
“Struggling with that part.”  
  
“I’m surprised you’re even trying.”  
  
“Admiral Pike was important to me.”  
  
“So I’ve heard.” Khan paused. “Were you related?”  
  
“No.”  
  
“A mentor?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
The monosyllabic answers and the flat tone they were delivered in were indicators that Khan was treading in dangerous territory. He actually had some conflict about doing so: Khan was still not entirely convinced that Kirk could be completely trusted, but he also did not want to alienate someone who might yet prove to be an ally. Or at least useful. That being said, whatever Pike was to Kirk, it didn’t go far in making him regret that the man was dead. Kirk had trusted Marcus once upon a time, too, and they both knew very well how that had ended.  
  
And maybe, possibly… Khan had kept this particular subject pushed deep into the darker corners of his mind, in a place where the emotions couldn’t affect him, but Kirk’s attitude about Pike was starting to remind him about his mother (or at least the woman he was taught to regard as his mother, the differences in their physical appearances strongly indicated that there was no biological component to their relationship) Sarina, and her untimely death.  
  
Khan cautiously pushed the memories deeper, forced them away by hyper-focusing on the road, the passing trees, the way the light reflected off the hood of the car. Anything but the memory of her body and how oddly her neck had been bent after she’d been thrown against the wall in the explosion.  
  
He abruptly squeezed his eyes shut.  
  
Damn it. This wasn’t working.  
  
“Are you alright?”  
  
When Khan opened his eyes again, Kirk was glancing between him and the road, brow furrowed with confusion. “I’m fine.”  
  
“You look really, really pale. More than usual, I mean.”  
  
“I’m _fine_.” The words came out with a bit more bite than he’d intended.  
  
“Alright.”  
  
And that was that.  
  
[---]  
  
Jim had been grateful when the conversation about Pike had tapered off. He hadn’t been lying when he’d said that he didn’t fully forgive Khan for killing him, but he _was_ telling the truth when he’d said that he was trying to understand why Khan did what he did, that he was trying to be _compassionate,_ God damn it.  
  
They’d been quiet for the last half hour or so, Jim focusing on the road and Khan focusing on… Well, whatever the hell went on inside his head when he wasn’t talking. But thanks to that conversation, Jim had a question.  
  
It was a good question- to him, anyway- but he wasn’t entirely sure he wanted the answer to it. Because if he got the wrong one, there was a chance he was going to pull the car over and start slugging the guy again. Even if it didn’t hurt him the way it would hurt a normal person, at least Jim would get some stress-release.  
  
“Khan.”  
  
“Yes?”  
  
“Did you know who Pike was before you attacked the meeting?”  
  
“I knew of him, yes. I know of many Starfleet Admirals.”  
  
Jim took a deep breath. “Did you target him specifically?”  
  
“I specifically targeted what appeared to be an Admiral lying on the floor. His uniform clearly indicated his rank. But I assume the meaning of your question pertains more to whether or not I targeted him as a result of some personal grievance on my part?”  
  
“That’s the gist of it.”  
  
“I did not. I had no prior acquaintance with Admiral Pike prior to the attack.” A pause. “Does it matter? Even if I had intentionally sought to kill him, he still would have been one of many men and women dead as a result of the attack. My goal was to kill Marcus and as many of his associates as possible, as to avenge my crew.”  
  
“If you had known that he had nothing to do with Marcus and Section 31, would you have still killed him?”  
  
“What makes you so sure he wasn’t?”  
  
Jim slammed on the brakes reflexively, fortunate only after the fact that there were no cars immediately behind him at the moment. He pulled off to the side of the road, not trusting himself to drive until he’d calmed down.  
  
_Breathe, breathe, don’t freak out, don’t choke him, just breathe._  
  
“He _wasn’t_ ,” Jim growled.  
  
“I can see the possibility bothers you.”  
  
“There is no ‘possibility’, here. Pike would _never_ have gone along with Marcus. Never. Not a damn day before you killed him, this guy was chewing me out because I accidentally let some natives of a Class M planet see the Enterprise, all because I was trying to save Spock.” He wasn’t sure the story was as coherent out loud as it was in his head. “He followed the rules. He didn’t want a war. He would _never_ have allowed Marcus to get away with this.”  
  
Khan was quiet.  
  
Jim dug his fingers into the fabric of his pants, trying to stop them from shaking. “You don’t believe me.”  
  
“I have a rather reasonable amount of skepticism towards Starfleet as a whole. My skepticism that your Admiral Pike had no idea whatsoever as to what his colleague was getting up to in Section 31 is but one item on a very long list.”  
  
“And my word counts for nothing?” Jim pressed, looking pointedly at Khan. “Have I not been honest with you? Have I _not_ followed through on every promise I’ve made? That your crew wouldn’t be harmed, that you would receive a fair trial?”  
  
“You have displayed a startling amount of honesty,” Khan conceded. “More than I was expecting, to be frank. But you’ve also proven that you have very little understanding of how your own organization works. Your faith in Admiral Pike’s moral leanings seem less a matter of reasoned logic and more a matter of blind faith to an authority figure that you clearly hold in high regard.”  
  
Jim’s eyes narrowed. “Are you calling me naïve?”  
  
“Yes.” He’d figured Khan wasn’t the kind to beat around the bush, but that was startlingly direct.  
  
It probably wouldn’t help to go with his gut-reaction, which would be saying ‘I am NOT’ and maybe punching Khan in the face for good measure, riled as Jim still was. Instead he said, “And what leads you to that conclusion, beyond the fact that I respected Christopher enough to stand up for him?”  
  
Khan cocked his head a little, interested. “What is the goal of Starfleet, Kirk?”  
  
That… Wasn’t what Jim had been expecting, but okay.  
  
“Peaceful exploration of the galaxy, as well as establishing diplomatic ties with the people we meet during our exploration.”  
  
“‘ _Peaceful exploration’_.” Khan rolled the words around his mouth with a delicate sort of mockery, smirking.  
  
Jim frowned. “Don’t look so goddamn smug. Just tell me what you want to say.”  
  
“You actually believe that that’s what Starfleet’s mission is.”  
  
His hands clenched harder, nails digging through the fabric of his pants and into his legs. “Yes, I do.” And Jim did, with all his heart. He knew where this was going now.  
  
“You do not, in fact, see the interesting coincidence between your crew’s scheduled five-year mission to seek ‘diplomatic ties’ with other planets, and the growing tension between the Federation and the Klingon and Romulan Empires?”  
  
Jim had to put his hands back on the steering-wheel so that he didn’t hurt himself. “If you’re going to give me the speech on how Starfleet is nothing but a smoke-screen for gathering allies for an upcoming war, then you should know that you’re not saying anything that I haven’t heard from a thousand critics and skeptics before.”  
  
“I would think you’d give my skepticism a little more credence, given that I was awoken by a man who was determined to kick-start that war by sacrificing you and your crew.” Khan said smoothly.  
  
Jim’s stomach twisted the way it did whenever he was embarrassed. As much as he hated it, Khan actually had a point. Before everything that had happened with Marcus, it had been easy to dismiss the criticisms of Starfleet and its missions to other planets as crackpot conspiracy theories. But he couldn’t exactly sit with a guy who’d been used to build machines of war by an Admiral of Starfleet and say that Starfleet, as an institution, was a peaceful organization without a “but” on the end, now could he?  
  
Because at the end of the day, Khan knew better. Khan knew Marcus, Khan knew the Vengeance- and Khan knew Section 31.  
  
“Alright,” Jim grunted, putting the car into drive and checking to see if any more cars were coming. “I get it. You think I’m some naïve kid who thinks his superiors and colleagues are above suspicion, and I think you’re letting your experience with Marcus color your opinion of everybody in Starfleet.”  
  
“Spend some time with Section 31 and you’ll understand.”  
  
Jim sighed, but didn’t argue. He was already getting a headache.  
  
[---]  
  
“Oh, God damn it.”  
  
Khan hadn’t realized he’d been nodding off until Kirk’s voice woke him up. The car had begun to stutter, and Kirk was directing it over to the side of the road. The sky was darker now, evening starting to turn into night. Kirk had been quietly irritable ever since the end of their conversation, and Khan had opted to stay silent rather than provoke him further. He’d made his point.  
  
Kirk got out of the car, slamming the door behind him. “Fucking crappy rental agency, I should have gone to the reliable one across town, but _no_ , I didn’t have _time_ , I had to _hurry._ ”  
  
“What’s wrong?”  
  
“I don’t know,” Kirk snapped, lifting up the hood.  
  
Khan sighed. How he’d managed to get anything even close to sleep with an angry Starfleet Captain nearby was beyond him; that being said, it was surprisingly comfortable in the car, and he was loath to leave it so quickly. Nonetheless, Khan opened the door and stepped out onto the side of the road, circling around to look down at the engine.  
  
…And, of course, was abruptly reminded that this was 2259, not 2001. Cars that ran on electricity or solar power had been an interesting experiment in his time, not a commonality. This car seemed to run on that sort of technology, but without a schematic in front of him to understand the more complex workings of the car, he wasn’t inclined to play around with it.  
  
“What?”  
  
“I’d forgotten that cars have changed over the last two-hundred fifty years. I haven’t seen a car like this before.”  
  
“Oh yeah, you’re from the stone-age. I forgot. You’ve built starships, but you can’t fix a car?” Kirk seemed amused by that point, and Khan glared at him.  
  
“I am more than capable of fixing the car, but to do so properly would require me to explore it in-depth, which would take time, which I am under the distinct impression we don’t have.”  
  
Kirk’s amusement melted away. “Right. Okay. Fortunately, I _have_ repaired cars like this before, so I’ll give you a crash course in 23 rd century car mechanics. I think the battery’s on the fritz- that doesn’t usually happen in a car that’s properly maintained, but since I was in a hurry I went to probably one of the _shadiest_ car rental places in San Francisco, so that’s probably-”  
  
Something that sounded distinctly like phaser-fire erupted behind them, from down the road.  
  
Both Khan and Kirk turned to look, the latter squinting against the growing darkness. There appeared to be a truck coming. Silhouettes of distinctly humanoid forms were hanging out the windows, shooting what appeared to be phasers up at the sky. “What on Earth is that?” Khan asked.  
  
Kirk stared for a moment longer, and then his eyes widened. “Shit.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Don’t make eye-contact,” Kirk muttered, looking down at the car. “In fact, don’t look at them at all.”  
  
“Why not?”  
  
“They’re gang members.”  
  
“I thought such things had been done away with in this _enlightened_ day and age,” Khan couldn’t resist jabbing.  
  
“Crime’s been reduced, it hasn’t been completely eradicated,” Kirk responded flatly. “You can fix poverty, you can fix famine, but you can’t always fix people. Some have a natural inclination to the fine art of Assholery.”  
  
He wasn’t wrong.  
  
Khan was not at all inclined to turning his back on a potential threat- all he could think of was taking one of those beams right in the middle of his back- but he couldn’t deny that he and Kirk were at a distinct disadvantage. Khan wasn’t armed, and he was entirely certain that Kirk wasn’t either. The stretch of road they were on was largely deserted, and so there would be no timely response from local authorities either. As much as it pained him, turning his back and keeping his head down sounded like the best option for the time being.  
  
So, naturally, the truck came to a stop right next to them.  
  
“Hey, boys!” Khan looked up. There were six men in the truck, three in the cab and three in the bed. One of the men in the bed had a bat, one was wearing brass knuckles ( _dented_ brass knuckles); in the cab, the man who’d called out to them was the one holding the phaser. It was impossible to see the other two men in the cab, but Khan felt safe in assuming that they were as physically large as their visible counterparts. “You, uh, having a little car trouble?”  
  
Khan opened his mouth to respond, but Kirk grabbed his shoulder and stomped on his foot. “No, no, we’re just fine, thanks!”  
  
“Really?” The man with the phaser got out of the truck.  
  
Khan sent a glance at Kirk, who didn’t look at him, but communicated his desires by digging his nails into Khan’s shoulder. _Don’t say a fucking word._  
  
“Yup! Really, we’re just fine.”  
  
The man walked easily over to Khan and Kirk, looking down at the inner workings of the car. After a moment, he nodded. “Ohh, I see what the problem is. You see it? Right here?” Kirk hesitated, but then looked.  
  
“I don’t see anything.”  
  
The man rolled his eyes. “Right _here_ , see?”  
  
Kirk leaned forward a little bit, and Khan abruptly realized that it was a setup. “Kirk, don’t-”  
  
Too late. The man brought his hand up to the back of Kirk’s head and slammed it down onto the engine. It wasn’t the sound of skull hitting metal, however, and Kirk was still very much conscious when he slid to the ground, spitting blood. The impact must have made him bite his cheek.  
  
The man was laughing, as were his friends in the truck. Their first mistake was assuming that there was no threat to be had, that they didn’t need to keep their guard up. The second mistake was Kirk’s attacker’s: He should have kept that phaser on Khan. But Khan found that no matter how much society improved its educational standards, there were some people who still couldn’t resist being _stupid._  
  
Khan drove the flat of his hand into the man’s nose, knocking him back and yanking the phaser out of his hand before he hit the ground. He raised the phaser towards the truck and fired once, a warning shot that hit the edge of the door. “Leave,” He ordered, dragging their friend (currently choking and gagging around a broken nose) up by the collar of his jacket and throwing him bodily into the bed of the truck. He clicked the phaser from ‘stun’ to ‘kill’, and fired another warning shot into the air. “ _Now._ ”  
  
He must have taken their only phaser, because the men took off, the truck doing a u-turn and speeding back down the road from whence they’d come. Khan stayed where he was until it was clear that they had no intention of coming back, and then turned to Kirk. “Are you alright?”  
  
The Captain was wiping blood from his mouth, wincing. “Yeah, I cut my cheek, but other than that I’m fine.” He frowned angrily. “Damn it, that was stupid. I can’t believe I fell for that.”  
  
“I can.”  
  
“If you call me naïve again, I’m gonna punch you, phaser or not.”  
  
[---]  
  
Eventually they were driving again.  
  
By now it was totally dark, and Jim felt the pressure to get back to San Francisco even more acutely now.  
  
“You know, I can’t believe I forgot to ask this- but how the hell did you get so far walking?”  
  
“I didn’t, the whole way.”  
  
“How much of it did you walk?”  
  
Khan thought for a moment. “Maybe three-quarters of the way.”  
  
Jim rolled his eyes. “Jesus, you say that like it’s so goddamn normal.”  
  
Khan shrugged. “It’s not my fault I’m better.”  
  
Jim barely resisted rolling his eyes at that. Khan said it so simply, like it was just a natural truth of the world that he accepted: The sky is blue, the grass is green, and I Am Better. “True,” He agreed. “You didn’t really get a choice in that department, as I understand it. But you do know you have the option of not rubbing how much ‘better’ you are in everyone’s faces, right?”  
  
“My stating the factually correct and or obvious is not ‘rubbing’ anything in anyone’s face.”  
  
“Keep telling yourself that. To yourself, preferably: Once you’re on the Enterprise, it would be in your best interest to demonstrate humility, because I’m pretty sure most of my crew won’t take kindly to the ‘I Am Better’ bit.”  
  
“Given the… _Dislike_ I must assume you crew harbors for me, to say the least, why _did_ you volunteer- and I use that word loosely- to take me onto your crew?”  
  
“I already told you: No one else would take you.” Okay, there was more to it than just that, but Jim wasn’t about to get into it now. Or ever, if he had the choice.  
  
“What capacity would you have me work in?”  
  
Jim thought for a moment. Honestly, that was still a big question: Right now, Science looked like the most likely option. He really didn’t want Khan in Engineering, because that was Scotty’s domain, and Jim had done enough to piss Scotty off. He was pretty sure if he stuck Khan down there, where he and Scotty would undoubtedly butt heads day-in and day-out, they would probably end up killing each other. The same could be said for Bones and Medical.  
  
Security might prove to be a challenge as well, since it might not do well to have Khan in any capacity that might require him to be violent, at least not until Jim was satisfied that he understood when and where it was appropriate to use deadly force according to Starfleet protocol. He certainly didn’t want Khan in a Command position either, because he did not want the guy making anything even remotely resembling a decision that could affect the entire ship until Jim was satisfied that his own brand of cold, hard battle-logic wouldn’t lead to any unnecessary violence.  
  
“Still thinking on that, actually. Obviously you’re qualified for a lot of positions, but it depends on where we’ll need you most. And even then, I have to get permission from Command.”  
  
“Naturally.”  
  
Jim realized that they had hit on a point of interest for Khan, one that was a reasonably neutral topic that wouldn’t lead to conflict. “Did you have a preference for what section you work in? Other than Captain,” He clarified, while giving Khan a pointed look that he hoped conveyed that he was trying to be funny.  
  
Khan shook his head. “I have no preference.”  
  
Well, there went that hope for a decent, non-confrontational conversation. “None? No particular department holds any allure for you?”  
  
“Any of them would be acceptable.”  
  
Jim thought for a moment. What came to mind was maybe not the best choice if he wanted the conversation to remain pleasant, but it was worth asking anyway. “Is there any department you definitely _don’t_ want to be in?”  
  
“Medical.” Khan didn’t hesitate as he said it, so either he’d already had it on his mind, or else he _really_ didn’t like doctors.  
  
“Alright, no Medical.” Khan offered up no further departments, and so Jim moved on to something else that had been bothering him. “So… What did you do, before? When you weren’t doing your training and your other… Augment stuff, what did you do?”  
  
Khan thought longer about that than Jim considered normal. How difficult was it to think of something you did in your leisure time? He himself liked to drink, flirt, listen to jazz, and read up on American history, and it only took him a moment or so to think those things up. Not _five._  
  
“I read, mostly,” Khan remarked. “There wasn’t much time for leisure beyond my ‘Augment stuff’, as you put it. We were encouraged to practice our physical skills and further our education.”  
  
“That sounds boring.” It reminded Jim of the things Spock told him Vulcan children did for leisure, but at least Vulcans _enjoyed_ that sort of thing. Khan, on the other hand, didn't sound wildly enthusiastic about it.  
  
“It could be tedious.” He paused. “But it was familiar. And I had others of my kind to interact with.” ‘Unlike now’ seemed to be what he was getting at, but without actually having to come out and say it.  
  
Jim had had limited contact with Khan throughout the trial. Really, he didn’t know much about the man personally beyond what he’d told them when he’d been a prisoner on the Enterprise; everything else Jim knew about him, mostly regarding his physical and psychological health, he knew from what he and Bones and Spock had poured over during the trial.  
  
But despite what Khan clearly wanted to project to him and everyone else who happened to be nearby, Jim was starting to sense that Khan was homesick. Everyone he knew beyond the other Augments (and that was probably limited) had died centuries ago. His crew was locked down in an unknown location, and whether it was real or imagined, he perceived that they were at risk of being killed. He was two-hundred fifty years away from anything that he might conceive as being normal or familiar. And pretty much every experience he’d had since waking up was bad.  
  
And damn it, Jim felt _bad_ about that. It was part of the reason he was willing to throw Khan a bone, give him some leniency, because if Jim were in the same situation- two hundred years into the future, surrounded by people he considered to be hostile, his crew’s lives in imminent danger, believing that nothing and no one would come to his aid- he’s not entirely sure he wouldn’t do something extreme himself. Obviously not as extreme as what Khan did, there were other factors surrounding why he made the choices he did, but still.  
  
Jim wasn’t a bad guy. He didn’t always make the best choices, sure, but he wasn’t evil, and he knew it. He didn't want to see anyone burn if he could help it. If Khan could be rehabilitated, if he could prove that he was more than just some cold, vicious bastard, he could work off his sentence with Starfleet, and be reunited with his crew in time, and then everyone could be happy.  
  
He hoped.  
  
[---]  
  
Kirk didn’t relax until the city came into sight. And even then, only a very small bit of tension left his shoulders.  
  
“I’d think that if anyone realized I was gone by now, your friends would have called to warn you about it.”  
  
“Yeah, well, we still need to hurry. Confrontations with people like the Saints-” Khan assumed that was the name of the gang they’d encountered, he hadn’t bothered asking for clarification after the fact, “-could lead to complications. They get pinched on a regular basis, and I wouldn’t put it past any of them to tell the cops about their weird confrontation with the freakishly strong guy in the middle of nowhere.”  
  
“In that case, the smart thing to do would have been to kill them all. Leave no witnesses to give testimony later.”  
  
Kirk sighed, slowing down for a stop-light and tapping his finger nervously on the wheel. “Killing is not Plan A, Khan. Usually it’s not even Plan B, C, or D. You’re gonna need to get used to that.”  
  
“I find the further down in the alphabet it is, the lesser one’s chances of survival without serious injury or mutilation.”  
  
“You understand that this is the exact reason that the court ruled to have mercy on you, right? You realize that the tinkering the scientists did with your brain is the basis on which they decided to give you a chance to prove you could be better than a cold-blooded killer with no remorse or capacity for compassion, right?”  
  
Khan snorted. That Kirk thought the courts had done anything but damage control in the wake of Marcus’s lunacy was darkly hilarious. “You and your society have become so pathetically _soft_. I may come from the ‘stone-age’, but at least then we knew how to deal with a blatant threat to safety and security.”  
  
“Yeah, well, maybe I thought you deserved a chance to be better.” Kirk snapped… And then his eyes widened. “ _Shit._ ”  
  
Khan stared at him. “What?”  
  
“Nothing. You heard nothing.”  
  
“Are you saying that _you_ … Suggested that the court have mercy on me?”  
  
“Oh God, I need a gag. I need to gag myself.”  
  
“Why the _hell_ would you do that?’  
  
“You know, that might be the most human you’ve sounded since I met you?”  
  
“Don’t insult me. Green light, Kirk, green light.” Kirk swore and quickly hit the accelerator before the cars behind them could get testy.  
  
Khan had to give credit to the younger man: He was quite possibly the most unpredictable bastard that he’d ever encountered. And Khan had encountered a few in his time. Why on _Earth_ would this man argue leniency for him? There was honestly nothing for him to gain from Khan being alive and unfrozen: He didn’t need Khan’s technical prowess, or his savagery- indeed, he’d just implied that he reviled the latter. He had no _use_ for him.  
  
Which came back to the possibility that this was sheer, baffling honesty: Kirk honestly, truly, genuinely believed that Khan deserved a chance to be more than what he’d been born to be. Even after all he’d done.  
  
Khan was unaccustomed to receiving that level of faith in someone’s better nature from anyone but his crew. Kirk was not a member of his crew, and indeed, if everything went according to plan, Kirk would be his superior, his captain; given the circumstances, he didn’t _need_ to make Khan believe the depths of his sincerity, since Khan’s crew’s safety was (allegedly) hinging on Khan’s cooperation and nothing else.  
  
“I can see you’re struggling with this,” Kirk said, sarcasm seeping from his words. “Want me to say it again? Slower this time?”  
Khan ignored him. “What I did was not a mistake. I arranged a terrorist attack. I opened fire on a room full of people, _your_ people, and I did it for revenge. There was premeditation. I knew what I was doing.”  
  
He didn’t know why he was so intent on cementing that idea in Kirk’s mind. It would be far better for him to let the man persist in whatever fantasy he had about Khan’s ability to redeem himself for his crimes. Khan did what he needed to, no more, no less; he saw no reason to abandon his training in a world that was clearly just as vicious as it had been when he’d been born; they’d only gotten better at hiding it.  
  
Maybe it was just too painful to see an otherwise intelligent, if not naïve, man give way to stupidity.  
  
Kirk didn’t respond to Khan’s assertion for a few minutes. Khan counted again: Two-hundred seventy-three seconds.  
  
“You arranged a terrorist attack. You fired on a room full of officers, for revenge for what Marcus did to you and your crew.”  
  
When he paused, Khan realized he expected confirmation and nodded accordingly. “Yes.”  
  
“And I almost fired a payload of torpedoes at you,” Kirk said, softly. “You, who was hiding on the Klingon home-world, where we had absolutely no right to be. The Klingons would really, really love a reason to go to war with the Federation, and they would have really, really enjoyed killing my crew if we’d been caught there. In fact they would have killed me, Lieutenant Uhura, and Commander Spock if you hadn’t jumped in. I knew the risks. I knew what I was doing was reckless and stupid, and I didn’t care, because I just really wanted to have the pleasure of killing you, or beating the shit out of you. I could have started a war that would have killed not only my crew, but millions of others. Because of revenge.”  
  
Khan did not speak, even when Kirk glanced at him as though expecting commentary.  
  
“There are some people who think I’m a hero because of the Narada thing, or because of what happened with Marcus. But a lot more people think I should be removed from my Captaincy, because Marcus may have encouraged my actions, but…”  
  
“…But you also participated, of your own free will, until you had a chance to hear my side of the story.”  
  
“A side, I should mention, I would not have heard if Spock hadn’t talked me out of blowing you to Kingdom Come.”  
  
So this wasn’t stupidity, so much as… Misplaced empathy, perhaps?  
  
Much as he was inclined to disagree, to remind Kirk of the vast difference between the two of them as men, Khan could see the logic in it. He’d done what he felt he needed to in order to secure his crew and avenge his and their treatment, and Kirk had done what he felt was necessary to avenge his mentor and protect Starfleet from a terrorist.  
  
But the difference was that if the situation were reversed, this conversation would not be happening. Two-hundred fifty years ago, Khan would not have had mercy on Jim Kirk if he’d opened fire on the facility that housed Khan and his crew. He would have hunted him down and put a bullet in his brain before the man could plead for mercy. Khan was not raised to be kind, to look for opportunities to bestow mercy or forgiveness; he was raised to kill.  
  
Whatever Starfleet was, good or bad, it seemed that Jim Kirk was operating on his own principles.  
  
And it shouldn’t have, but it made Khan relax just a bit.

  
[-delta-]

They reached Jim's neighborhood around 2:00am.  
  
“You’re coming to my place,” Jim muttered, too exhausted to be delicate about it and relieved to see his building at the end of the block. “I have a spare room you can crash in.”  
  
“Is that wise?” Khan inquired. “I presume Starfleet will take issue with you harboring someone who is effectively a prisoner in your private quarters.”  
  
“You mistake me for a man who’s awake enough to give a fuck.”  
  
Maybe he was content to follow Jim’s lead, maybe he was too tired himself to do anything but, but Khan followed Jim up to his apartment without a peep of protest or snark; which was good, because at this point Jim might not have been able to resist the urge to trip him or otherwise do something similarly childish. It took all the willpower he had not to just face-plant into the carpet once he’d unlocked the door.  
  
“Alright,” He managed, “Here’s the grand tour: My bedroom is over there. Please do not choke me in my sleep. Your- shit, shit, shit!”  
  
Khan looked vaguely amused. “Forget something?”  
  
“Yeah…” Jim cringed, pulling his phone out of his pocket and tapping in Bones’s number. “Shit, shit, he’s going to slaughter me.” He hadn’t checked in once over the course of the day. ‘Slaughter’ was pretty nice compared to what Bones was probably gonna do to him.  
  
The phone only rang once.  
  
“ _Jim?_ ” Was the anxious query at the other end.  
  
“Bones?”  
  
“ _JESUS CHRIST, JIM!_ ” Jim had to pull the phone away from his ear, wincing. “ _Why the hell didn’t you check in before? I thought the lunatic had murdered you or something!_ ”  
  
“The lunatic can hear you,” Khan said flatly.  
  
Bones heard. “ _Go fuck yourself. Did you hear that, smartass? We could’ve gotten our asses handed to us today if Jim didn’t find you._ ”  
  
“I’m weeping.”  
  
“ _Oh my God, Jim, I will not spend five years in space with this asshole. I won’t do it. I will lie down in the middle of the street in heavy traffic._ ”  
  
“Is he always this dramatic?” Khan inquired. Jim nodded wearily.  
  
“Bones, it’s fine. I’m fine. And I’m tired. Please. Save it for tomorrow.”  
  
“ _It is tomorrow._ ”  
  
“Bones,” Jim groaned.  
  
“ _Alright, fine. But just so you know, as far as the guards are concerned, you and Khan are still in that apartment. So they may or may not think the two of you were doing the horizontal mambo all day. Have fun with that._ ”  
  
Jim slapped a hand over his eyes as the call ended. He deliberately did not look at Khan.  
  
“Was he covering for you?”  
  
Jim opened his eyes. Khan seemed to be ignoring the implications of what Bones had just suggested and pressed on to less embarrassing topics. “Yeah, he was.”  
  
Khan cocked his head, clearly intrigued. “Is there a reason for that? I hardly get the impression that he cares whether I rot in a cryotube or not.”  
  
Jim struggled for a moment, wondering how much he should say.  
  
It was Jim’s, Bones’s, and Spock’s reputations that had been staked on the idea that Khan might be worthy of rehabilitation. Jim wasn’t exactly in love with the guy- again, he hadn’t forgotten about Pike, and wasn’t likely to in the near future- but given the circumstances surrounding everything that had happened, given that Khan had refrained from any duplicitous behavior when Jim had given him a bit of leash, a bit of trust, the idea of consigning him to cryostasis for the conceivable future seemed a little too close to a death sentence. And as angry as part of him still was, he didn’t think Khan deserved a death sentence.  
  
Maybe that made him weak, maybe he was showing too much sympathy to a man who’d proven that he could be cold and calculating and savage when he felt it was the appropriate course of action; or maybe it was the thing that stopped him from becoming another Admiral Marcus. Who knew?  
  
The point being, Jim had argued that Khan deserved something less than death or pseudo-death. Prison was a risky alternative, because with nothing to look forward to, the possibility of escape (and perhaps further revenge) would be much higher. Why not make engage in rehabilitation whilst letting Khan make himself useful to Starfleet? Why not give him a goal to work for, something that would give him sufficient motivation to be _good_ until they could find a way to make him _want_ to be good?  
  
“Is that even _possible?_ ” Admiral Tullsey had snorted.  
  
That was where Bones came in. He’d studied what medical files existed on Khan (many of them had been turned over to Starfleet when Section 31 was being investigated) and had come to the conclusion, based on past psychiatric evaluations, that Khan did have a capacity for empathy- despite Bones’s numerous jabs to the contrary, Khan wasn’t a psychopath. He had argued that Khan’s way of thinking was not too terribly removed from Spock’s, in a way: He evaluated his choices for the ones that would yield the best outcome based on his wants, needs, and priorities.  
  
If his priority was the safety of his crew, it was clear that everything else took a backseat. Judging from the records, if the mission was the priority, then everything else took the backseat. It was not unheard of for emotions to interfere with an Augments’ reasoning abilities, but it was rarer than in, say, a normal human.  
  
“And for all I know, some of that may be coming from the fact that he’s had very little social interaction beyond his fellow Augments or the scientists that were- or have recently been- experimenting on him. He hasn’t spent any significant time amongst non-Augmented humans- or anyone else, for that matter- that he’s been on equal-footing with. They’ve always been in a position of power over him, or under him. It’s not impossible to suggest that acclimating to a new social setting, one where he’s on a similar level of power as the people around him, might allow him to tap into his empathy in a way he’d previously been discouraged from doing,” Bones had suggested.  
  
“And what are the odds, here? What are the odds of this… _Augment_ being rehabilitated, versus him using whatever leash we give him to choke the rest of us with?”  
  
Finally, Spock came in. “It would be inaccurate to suggest that there is no risk to allowing Khan Noonien Singh to act as a member of Starfleet. He has proven that he is in fact capable of, as the Admiral is implying, taking whatever leeway is offered to him and using it to gain an advantage to himself and, in the process, do harm to others.” Jim had rubbed his temples, feeling a headache coming on. Because yeah, he knew that part of the routine was listing the things that could go wrong, but hearing Spock poke holes in everything they’d just said was still irritating.  
  
“However, it is worth mentioning that in reviewing the events that took place on board the Enterprise during the recovery of Mr. Singh from Qo’noS, as well as the confrontation with Admiral Marcus, there were multiple opportunities in which Mr. Singh could have made an attempt to escape or otherwise do harm to the crew members of the Enterprise, and refrained from doing so. I find that this further embellishes the point that Doctor McCoy made about Mr. Singh’s mental state, regarding his willingness to do harm.  
  
“In terms of raw statistical data, the precise numbers I will refrain from quoting for the sake of expediency, I find that the likelihood of rehabilitation for Mr. Singh is quite possible, but only under specific circumstances.”  
  
Bennett had looked wary about that. “Those being?’  
  
“First and foremost, Mr. Singh requires the appropriate motivation to, one could say, ‘behave himself’. He has expressed a deep mistrust for Starfleet as an institution and will have no intrinsic desire to perform his functions, assuming he is allowed to become an active member of Starfleet’s operations, honestly or effectively. His best hope for rehabilitation lies, as Captain Kirk suggested, in the potential reward that will come for good behavior: Namely, the assurance of his crew’s immediate physical safety, and their eventual release from cryostasis.”  
  
Things had progressed from there.  
  
Starfleet had, of course, gotten back at them for the audacious appeal by shoving Khan onto the Enterprise (knowing damn well that they were due for a five-year mission in six more months), but Jim was relieved to know that he hadn’t put his neck on the line for nothing.  
  
That, as it happened, led to the uncomfortable wondering about how much of this appeal on Khan’s behalf was for Khan’s benefit, versus how much of it was because Jim wanted to alleviate his own guilt regarding his missteps during this entire clusterfuck of a situation: Nibiru, his intended revenge on Khan and nearly starting a war in the process, nearly getting his whole crew _destroyed_ because of his own idiocy.  
  
_How much of this is because Khan deserves it, and how much of it is because you want to believe that you deserve a second chance from all your fuckups as well?_  
  
Jim sighed, scratching his fingers through his hair and trying to fend off the heaviness in his eyes for just a few more minutes.  
  
“Well, it wasn’t just me who stuck their neck out for you, let’s put it that way.”  
  
“You staked what’s left of your reputation on the idea that I deserved a chance to prove myself. That’s why you came after me.”  
  
 “You’re implying I came after you to save my own ass?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
God, but how did people like Khan function in their vacuum of pessimism? How did they not just flop on the floor and read sad poetry all day or something? Jim wouldn’t deny that there had been some degree of self-preservation in chasing down Khan, but he also hadn’t appealed on the guy’s behalf for shits and giggles either. “Well, there was also a pretty significant part of me that wasn’t interested in watching a shadow organization kidnap you and torture you.”  
  
“You wouldn’t have to watch. You’d never find them. Or me.”  
  
Jim covered his eyes. He was just too tired for this shit. “Oh God, I don’t think I can handle anymore doom and gloom from you today. There is a spare bedroom through that doorway, bathroom’s across the hall, I need sleep. Goodnight.”  
  
“It’s morning.”  
  
“Fuck you!”  
  
[---]  
  
Khan didn’t sleep.  
  
He had never slept in another person’s home before. Never. There had never been occasion to. There were always dormitories, bunks, roommates and medical beds; never a personal space that belonged to a sole person. He had never been a guest in the personal home of another person. Not even his mother’s; she had lived at the facility in which he had been raised, in a small room he was rarely allowed to visit, never mind stay in overnight.  
  
He could recall, dimly, a time when he was very small and had woken up screaming from some nightmare. Khan had been young enough to still cry out when he was frightened, young enough to not understand what death meant, young enough that he didn’t grasp that the woman who he’d come to know as his mother was not actually his mother. And he had screamed and screamed and screamed until he’d woken the other children and the woman tasked with watching over them had called for Sarina. She had held him, cuddled him and cooed into his hair until he was calm again, but refused to let her leave in peace until he was asleep.  
  
Perhaps it was his enhanced brain’s ability to recollect things more clearly than the average man, or perhaps it was because smell was the strongest trigger for memory, but Khan could clearly recall the smell of his mother’s perfume on the night in question. It had been the last thing he’d been aware of as he’d fallen asleep, and it was the scent he’d come to associate exclusively with her, as Sarina wore no other perfume, and none of the other female scientists wore the same kind. It had gotten to a point where Khan, as a child and as an adult, knew his mother was nearby (or had been recently) simply because his enhanced sense of smell could detect the familiar scent even when it was faint.  
  
Remembering these things made Khan feel somewhat… Hollow. He’d been entirely unaware of the calming effect that smell had had on him until his mother had died and he had realized that he would never smell it again.  
  
That same feeling prevailed in him whenever he was confronted with some new oddity in the 23 rd century, some jarring reminder that it was not 2001 anymore and that the Botany Bay was not a highly advanced ship, that his crew was still sleeping, maybe to never wake up, that his mother was dead, that anything and everything that was ever familiar to him was now gone or tainted by the reminder that in many ways, he was entirely out of place in this new world.  
  
Khan would endure, as he always had, and he would do it without tears or other unbecoming displays of emotion, unless either became useful in preserving the lives of his crew. It was one of the greatest gifts his Augmented being gave him: If he felt something unpleasant, he could ignore it. Push it away the way that most humans only wished they could. He might have cried when his mother died, curled up in a ball and wasted away with grief the way many people did- instead, he took what he felt and pushed it so deeply into himself that he could only just feel an echo of it when he wasn’t vigilant at keeping it away.  
  
It was easier when he was calm and in control.  
  
Less so when his control had slipped.  
  
But Khan would not, could not admit that, barely to himself and never to anyone else, because there were always enemies waiting in the group of people one met who were willing to lend a sympathetic ear. Always someone waiting for that moment when one’s guard was down to pounce.  
  
The only people Khan could trust were his crew.  
  
And he was starting to accept that he would not be seeing them for a very, very long time yet.  
   
[---]  
   
Jim awoke at 10:00.  
  
His brain begged for more sleep, worn out from stress and the fatigue brought on from yesterday. But the sooner they snuck Khan back into his apartment, the better; by 10:17, he’d already come up with a reasonably convincing lie to fall back on if Command had found out that Khan had been missing from his apartment all day yesterday and half-ways into today.  
  
Sure, said lie might do more to reinforce the misconception that his relationship with Khan was more… _Amiable_ (to put it delicately) than it appeared, but at least he wouldn’t get his ass ripped open by a dozen angry Admirals and have to watch Khan get hauled off in cuffs.  
  
Khan was already fully dressed and sitting at the kitchen table. He didn’t look rested in the least- in fact, Jim could vaguely detect a shadow under the man’s eyes that hadn’t been there the day before.  
  
“Did you sleep?”  
  
“Does it matter?”  
  
“It does, actually. I know you still think I’m waiting to stab you in the back, but I do have reasonable concerns for the health and safety of my crew members, whether they’re on the ship or not. And in case you’ve forgotten, you are now part of my crew.” For a moment, Khan looked a little surprised by that assertion. But the expression was here and gone in a matter of seconds. “How long can you go without sleep before it becomes dangerous for you?”  
  
“Considerably longer than you can.”  
  
“When was the last time you actually slept?”  
  
“Within the last two-hundred years.”  
  
“You know, I think you and Bones are gonna get along better than either of you think. You both seem to take a really _deep_ pleasure in sassing me.” Jim jabbed the buttons on the coffee-maker. “Coffee? If you’re not sleeping, you’ll need something else to keep you from face-planting onto the pavement.”  
  
“That depends,” Khan remarked warily, “Is it still actual coffee that they use, or some unholy substitute?”  
  
Jim chuckled darkly, pulling a pair of mugs out of the cabinet. “Oh, don’t worry, it’s still coffee. If there’s one thing I don’t think the world could ever tolerate changing, it’s the basic ingredients of a cup of coffee. There would be rioting. Cities would burn. White-collar employees would revert into screaming apes, pounding their chests and throwing their shit.”  
  
And then, lo and behold- Khan actually _smiled_. He didn’t smirk, he didn’t do that barely-noticeable thing with his lips that _Spock_ called a smile- he actually fucking smiled a genuine _smile_ , like he found what Jim said funny in a completely un-ironic way.  
  
Jim thought about making a note of it, but why ruin it? If he pointed out that Khan was smiling, he’d probably just start scowling again.

They sat quietly for a few minutes. If you’d told Jim on Qo’noS that the man he was beating the shit out of would one day be sitting in his kitchen drinking a cup of coffee with him, well, you’d probably have gotten a punch or two as well. Then again, stranger things had happened: When Bones had snuck him onto the Enterprise a year and half ago he didn’t think he’d be meeting an older Spock from an alternate universe either, so really, in a way, a nearly three-hundred year-old Augment drinking coffee in his kitchen was actually further down on the list of ‘weirdest shit that’s ever happened to me’.  
  
When an appropriate amount of peaceful quiet-time had passed, Jim glanced at the clock and said, “We need to get you home.”  
  
“And what ‘home’ is that?” Khan muttered, thumbing a chip in the table’s paintjob. “The closest thing I ever had to a home was the Botany Bay, and even then I spent most of my time sleeping in it. Beyond that, there were barracks and medical centers and laboratories. I was rarely in one place long enough to consider it home.”  
  
Jim gave a little shrug, both relieved and slightly unnerved by the lack of Khan’s usual bitterness, anger, or sarcasm. “Well, you’ll need time to adjust. Between the apartment and the Enterprise, you might find yourself more at home than you thought you could be.”  
  
“I suppose I’ll find out.”  
  
There was one more question Jim had, one that, like the one about Pike, he wasn’t sure he wanted answered. What Khan said could go a long way in Jim deciding whether or not he’d made a mistake in arguing that Khan should be shown a degree of mercy.  
  
“Can I ask you something?”  
  
Khan met his gaze. “What?”  
  
Jim hesitated. “Don’t bullshit me, okay? Just answer honestly. I just want to know the truth.”  
  
Khan raised an eyebrow at that, but nodded.  
  
“You could’ve killed me,” Jim said. “On the Vengeance. You could’ve shot me in the back any time you wanted after I handed you that phaser. In fact, I was expecting it: I gave orders to Scotty to drop you on my signal once we’d secured the ship. And when we were confronting Marcus, you had the perfect shot. You could have hit me in the head or back, and I would have been down. Carol and Scotty would have gone down fast enough; even together they’d be no match for you. Marcus was unarmed. You could have taken the Vengeance and piloted it yourself. You built it. Nobody could have worked it better. So why didn’t you?”  
  
Khan stared at him for a long time. And his expression was damnably unreadable, as blank and as neutral as it could possibly be.  
  
“You _were_ going to drop me,” He whispered after some time had passed. “I thought you were. I was surprised when you didn’t. Why didn’t you? You knew full well what I was capable of.”  
  
It wasn’t an answer to his question, but Khan’s tone was intensely curious and quietly astonished, and Jim was intrigued by that. In any case, Khan didn’t seem to hold it against him. “I thought about it,” he said. “I was so close to giving the order. I was convinced that you were using Scotty and I to get to the bridge, and that you were going to turn on us once Marcus and his men were disarmed. But then, once we were there, you didn’t…” Jim bit his lip, trying to explain. “…I think what put me off was that you had the perfect opportunity to turn on us, and you didn’t. You could have shot me, and you didn’t.”  
  
“Funny how these things work out,” Khan said slowly, setting his mug down carefully on the table, “Because I had a feeling you meant to neutralize me, and I fully intended to shoot you before that happened. I only discarded the idea when you ordered your companion to stand down.”  
  
Jim had figured as much. Idly, he wondered what might have happened if he’d gone through with it, if he’d signaled to Scotty to take the shot that would take Khan down. Judging from the medical files he and Bones had read, a phaser set to stun might not have been enough to keep Khan down for long, so maybe he’d narrowly avoided throwing a match onto gasoline for once- who knew?  
  
“So you backed down because I didn’t do anything to set you off?”  
  
Khan thought about that for a moment. “Partially,” He agreed, “I would have reacted quite violently if you’d aggressed against me in some way. On the other hand, I think I was… _Intrigued_ by your choice. I knew that _you_ knew the risk I posed to your crew and Starfleet, and so the logical conclusion was that you would neutralize me in order to assure their safety. When you didn’t, I suppose I was curious as to where you intended to go from there.” He paused. “I will confess that excessive curiosity has always been a flaw of mine.”  
  
Jim grinned. “Mine too!” Khan didn’t smile this time, but his lips did quirk upwards in something that wasn’t quite as smug as a smirk. Frankly, Jim was just shocked that the guy was willing to admit he _had_ a flaw. Maybe Khan was starting to put a little trust in him- and Jim, ever eager for a challenge, was more than willing to try to honor that trust- and then some, if he could. “Seriously, though, if you’re the curious type, you’ll love the upcoming five-year mission. We get to investigate new worlds, do research, study places and peoples and what have you- you’ll have fun, I promise.”  
  
Khan was quiet for a moment. “I suppose I’ll find out soon enough if that’s true, won’t I?”  
  
Jim smiled. “I’m gonna make a point of proving it to you, I swear.” He downed the rest of his coffee and looked at the clock again. “Alright, seriously, we need to get you back to your apartment. Every moment we’re gone is a moment those Starfleet security officers start to think you and I are getting to know each other biblically. Think you can sneak us back in without anyone seeing?”  
  
Khan snorted, and Jim took that as a yes.  
   
[---]  
   
Avoiding the security officers was simple enough. Khan had, quite literally, done training exercises disguised as game as a child where he and the other Augments had been required to stealthily make their way across a room without being detected by anyone. The game had been at its most difficult when sneaking past fellow Augments, who could detect things normal people couldn’t; but sneaking past the non-Augmented adults had eventually become as easy as breathing.  
  
“Of course,” He said to Kirk once they’d safely made it into the building, “I must assume that they have other ways of monitoring me that I may not be aware of.”  
  
Kirk waved a hand at that. “Don’t worry, I’ve got that worked out. I have a cover story, and a back-up just in case they realize you haven’t actually been here for the last twenty-four hours. Won’t actually do much to stop them from thinking we’ve been doing some very naked, aggressive cuddling, mind you, but at least they won’t realize you went AWOL.”  
  
“‘Aggressive cuddling’. Is that what they call it now?”  
  
“One of many. I pride myself on having a variety of euphemisms for every occasion. Want to hear some more?”  
  
That damned curiosity was rearing its ugly head again, but Khan squashed it down. He was too soft from lack of sleep, that was all. “No.”  
  
“Are you sure? There are some good ones. ‘Christening the yak’, ‘Bumping uglies’.”  
  
“God.”  
  
“‘Bruising the beef curtains’, ‘Cleaning the cobwebs with the womb broom’,” Kirk recited, walking up the staircase backwards.  
  
Khan’s lips twitched. “No.”  
  
“‘The Lust-and-thrust.’”  
  
“I am reasonably certain that there are other people who live in this building, Kirk.”  
  
“‘Moistening the Pope’, ‘Shaboinking’,”  
  
“ _Stop._ ”  
  
“‘Whittling the love branch’, ‘Cattle-prodding the oyster ditch with the lap rocket’-”  
  
That last one was too ridiculous, and Khan couldn’t help it: He choked out a laugh, dipping his head down in the hopes that Kirk would mistake it for a cough. But when he looked back up, Kirk was grinning at him insufferably.  
  
“You should laugh more often. It makes you look…” He gestured vaguely in the air with his hand. “…Not like a serial killer.”  
  
Khan snorted. “I’ll take it under consideration.”  
  
The apartment had been locked when he’d left, but Kirk just pushed the door open without issue. “I had to pick it when we came looking for you,” He explained when he saw Khan’s confusion. “Should still lock just fine, let me just make sure-”  
  
It occurred to Khan with a sudden, cold clarity that it really didn’t matter if the door locked or not. That agent from Section 31 had gotten in just fine, hadn’t they? Any mild feeling of calm he’d managed to develop over the course of the morning disappeared with frightening speed.  
  
Without even realizing it, Khan had slipped.  
  
He was starting to warm up to Kirk.  
  
Throughout the last twenty-four hours, he hadn’t even noticed that the feeling of loneliness just on the edge of his mind had almost fully retreated, and was now creeping back in with full force. Augmented though he was, Khan was still partially human, and humans were social creatures. The last day had provided him with more casual social interaction than he’d had in years, with a man who actually enjoyed carrying on semi-normal conversations with him. And now he was poised to be completely alone again, save for the hostile agents that were undoubtedly lurking nearby.  
  
He'd been shown some kindness, some compassion from someone who wasn't obligated to show him any, and like a fucking dog, his defenses had relaxed far too much for his liking. Enough so that he'd allowed himself to laugh at Kirk's jokes, accept a cup of fucking coffee from him without suspecting that it had been tampered with. This was weakness. This was the sort of thing that could spell death for him and, by extension, his crew. This was _below_ him. He did not need compassion from others. He did not need kindness or understanding. He did not need _friends._ He could do just fine without, as he had since waking up. And he certainly didn’t need to develop any fellowship with a man who would probably end up dead as a result of some well-intentioned defiance against his superiors’ wishes once he realized that they weren’t as pure as he thought.  
  
“O-kay, we’re good, I didn’t break your door,” Kirk scratched a hand through his hair. “One less thing to explain to Starfleet.”  
  
“Right.”  
  
Kirk frowned. “Hey, are you alright?”  
  
Khan looked back at Kirk with the same expression he’d used when they’d first met, one of cool detachment that could not be mistaken for anything familiar or friendly. “I’m fine. Shouldn’t you go reassure your Doctor friend that the lunatic hasn’t killed you?”  
  
The frown deepened. “Dude, a second ago you were acting normal and now you’re all-” As he’d spoken, Kirk had set a hand on Khan’s shoulder. Startled and somewhat panicked by the familiarity the gesture indicated to him, he quickly pushed it off and stepped away.  
  
“Well, as you and I are quite aware, Kirk, I am not _normal._ I am fine, and you had best be going.”  
  
“Is this about that Section 31 guy? Because I promise you, I’ll be having a chat with Command later about that. If those bastards think they can keep running around and doing whatever the hell they want, they’re in for a really _rude_ wake-up call.”  
  
The thought of Section 31 coming to him in his sleep again made Khan repress a shiver. He wouldn’t call what he had for them fear- he feared nothing. But he had a healthy respect for what they were capable of doing to him, and some extremely unpleasant memories of what they _had_ done to him. “It’s nothing to do with that. You’ve done your duty, you’ve ensured that neither of us will be hanged today, so it’s best to carry on with things, isn’t it?”  
  
Kirk was silent. Khan didn’t look at him, busying himself with unpacking the bag he’d brought with him. _Just leave_ , he thought. He’d need time to himself to work himself back to his usual state of mind, his usual fortitude. He’d need it if Section 31 came slipping in again.  
  
“Okay.” Kirk sounded resigned, even a little cool himself. Maybe Khan’s sudden shortness had offended him. Perhaps not the wisest course, then, since he was putting off the man who would be his Captain soon; but in fairness, Kirk knew well enough what he was. It was hardly Khan’s fault if he was the sort to get attached easily. “We’ll talk soon.”  
  
“I suppose so.”  
  
Khan only let out a breath when the door clicked shut.  
_  
We’re not friends,_ He wanted to say to Kirk. _Don’t think we are, because we never will be. You’ll never forgive me and I’ll never fully trust you._  
  
Though whether he was trying to convince Kirk, or his own tenaciously human part of that fact, Khan wasn’t sure.  
   
[---]

Damn it.  
  
Khan almost seemed _normal_ for a second there, and suddenly he was all up-tight again. And here Jim thought the guy was starting to chill out a bit. At least it proved that Khan was actually capable of behaving like a normal human being.  
  
Now, he thought as he glanced back up at the building, it was just matter of proving that he could behave that way long-term, because he wanted to, not because he felt he had to. In the meantime, Jim would have to prepare to bring him onto the Enterprise, incorporating him into the crew, and all of the complications that would come along with that.  
  
Jim blew out a little breath, then turned and strolled down the sidewalk back towards his car, making sure he was in plain view of any covert agents who were undoubtedly watching the apartment (Khan had estimated at least four).  
_  
Please, oh please,_ he thought as he walked, _do not let this be a bad call._  
   
-End

**Author's Note:**

> Jeeee-sus. 
> 
> This was going to be, like, 5,000 words tops.
> 
> And then this happened.
> 
> Holy shit.
> 
> ETA: If anyone's wondering why the date of publication changed, it's because I just realized that putting something into a draft means that it gets published the day I set the draft, not the day that I actually post it. :P


End file.
